Friday's Campaign Round-Up, 10.7.16

Today's installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.* After complaining incessantly about his microphone for days after last week's debate, Donald Trump has changed his mind. The Republican candidate now believes the microphone worked fine, but people working the soundboard at the debate venue were "oscillating" the levels while he spoke.* This, by the way, was part of a town-hall meeting Trump hosted in New Hampshire yesterday, which was a bit of a disaster.* Interesting report from NBC News on the campaigns' ground games: "Democrats entered the fall campaign with an army of paid staffers close to five times the size of Republicans' according to an NBC News analysis of Federal Election Commission filings."* Something called the 45Committee, which is "connected to" the Ricketts family, is launching "a multimillion-dollar spending effort in battleground state" in support of the Trump campaign.* The GOP's #NeverTrump contingent isn't done speaking up: "A group of 30 former GOP lawmakers signed a blistering open letter to Republicans on Thursday, warning that Donald Trump lacks the 'intelligence' and temperament to be president and urging the party to reject the Republican presidential nominee at the polls on Nov. 8."* Though it looked for a while like Trump was poised to win Ohio this year, two new polls suggest otherwise. Monmouth University shows Clinton up by two points, while PPP shows her leading by one point. Those are obviously narrow advantages, but for quite a while, practically every Ohio poll showed Trump ahead.* As Rachel noted on the show the other night, The Atlantic has only endorsed three presidential candidates since its founding in the 1850s: Abraham Lincoln in 1860, Lyndon Johnson in 1964, and Hillary Clinton this year.* In New Hampshire, the latest Suffolk poll shows Clinton up by just two, 44% to 42%.* In Vermont, incumbent Rep. Peter Welch (D), through a curious twist, will be the Democratic and the Republican congressional nominee this year.* Politico ran a piece this morning on a poll regarding the 2020 presidential race. No, really. (I'm not going to note the results because polling the 2020 race a month before the 2016 race is silly.)