The TAKE with Rick Klein
To the extent that there's consistency in President Donald Trump's reelection message, there's been this promise: The Trump campaign will define former Vice President Joe Biden for voters.
But now -- a year after the infamous Ukraine call where Trump asked for a "favor" connected to allegations about Biden, and inside of 100 days before Election Day -- there is growing evidence that repeated and scattershot attacks on Biden are falling flat.
A range of new national and battleground-state polling points in the same direction: This is an election about Trump far more than it is Biden. Key states are tipping toward Biden even as perceptions about him haven't moved significantly through the primary season and now the general election.
It may be that the president and his campaign are trying too many avenues of attack. They are simultaneously making the case that Biden is corrupt, senile and a vehicle for the far left; it's hard to imagine how anyone could be two of those things at the same time, much less all three.
Consider this nugget from the latest Marist/NBC poll in Arizona, which has Biden up by five points in a state Trump can't afford to lose. Among voters who say they dislike both Trump and Biden, Biden has a 27-point edge in vote preference, 56-29.
"A lot of Americans know of Joe Biden, far fewer know much about Joe Biden," Trump's new campaign manager, Bill Stepien, told reporters Friday.
Even if that's true, voters know plenty about Trump, and have more information about him flowing out every day. Amid crises that have crashed into campaign season, that might be all that matters this election year.
The RUNDOWN with Kendall Karson
Senate Republican leaders and Trump's top negotiators may have overcome divisions over the next coronavirus relief bill within their own ranks, with Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin touting they are all "on the same page" -- but awaiting in the near distance is Democrats' opposition, as the two sides continue to be at sharp odds.
Republican Leader Mitch McConnell is set to unveil the $1 trillion GOP plan on Monday afternoon, after Mnuchin and White House chief of staff Mark Meadows spent the weekend with members of Senate leadership's staff hammering out the final details of a forthcoming plan that is expected to cap unemployment benefits, which are set to expire by the end of the week without any action, at around 70% of a worker’s pre-pandemic wages, and include a second round of direct payments to Americans, among other proposals. But Democrats want to keep the full $600 per week federal benefit in place at least until January, and in the House that measure -- along with funding for schools, hospitals, front-line workers, nutrition assistance and more -- passed in a $3 trillion bill two months ago.
Meadows on Sunday pushed back on the notion that some 30 million out-of-work Americans currently receiving expanded pandemic unemployment insurance could face gaps in the assistance, instead seeking to cast the GOP's opposition, which resulted in the delay, as an incentive to urge people to return to the workforce.
"The original unemployment benefit actually paid people to stay home, and actually a lot of people got more money staying at home than they were going back to work, and so the president was very clear, our Republican senators have been very clear, we're not going to extend that provision," Meadows said on ABC's "This Week," pitching a tough sell to millions facing the fallout of a still-raging pandemic.
Mnuchin and Meadows, enthusiastic about their efforts, also appeared to float the possibility of pushing through a narrow piece of legislation and taking a more gradual approach, something House Speaker Nancy Pelosi firmly rejected last week.
"When you talk about piecemeal, this will be the fifth set of legislation," Mnuchin said. "So there’s no reason why we can’t have No. 5, 6 and 7 as we need to deal with issues."
Pelosi, still, isn't having any of it.
"We have been ready for two months and 10 days. I've been here all weekend hoping they had something to give us. They promised it this week. It didn't come," she said on CBS' "Face the Nation."
With Republicans and Democrats so far from agreement on the next coronavirus relief bill, it’s no wonder McConnell told reporters in his home state this weekend, "Hopefully in the next two to three weeks, we'll be able to come together and pass something that we can send over to the House and down to the president for signature."
The TIP with Molly Nagle
Former Vice President Biden will join the country as it says its final goodbye to Rep. John Lewis, traveling to Washington, D.C., Monday to pay his respects to the late congressman with his wife, Dr. Jill Biden. It marks the former vice president’s first publicly advised trip to the nation’s capital since coronavirus largely shut down the country in March.
Along with his trip to D.C. to remember the civil rights icon, Biden is also in the midst of launching his "Build Back Better" economic plan, having rolled out portions of the policy over the last three weeks. The final, forthcoming pillar will focus on advancing racial equity.
"We've seen again this year the tragic costs of systemic racism. Biden believes that addressing those costs has to be core to every part of the economic agenda, and also a distinct priority in its own right," the campaign said in a preview of the overall economic policy.
Biden will also continue the search for his running mate, facing continued pressure to choose an African American woman to join him on the ticket -- something Lewis himself once promoted.
"I think Vice President Biden should look around. It would be good to have a woman of color. It would be good to have a woman. It would be good to have a woman who looks like the rest of America," Lewis said when he endorsed Biden in April.
ONE MORE THING
The 2020 general election countdown hit the 100-day mark on Sunday and pandemic conditions continue to sweep the nation, forcing many Americans to reassess their approach to voting practices ahead of November. Available data seems to indicate that Democrats are leaning into mail voting in greater numbers than Republicans.
THE PLAYLIST
ABC News' "Start Here" podcast. Monday morning's episode features ABC News Political Director Rick Klein, who brings us up to speed on the presidential race less than 100 days from Election Day. Then, ABC News' Kanya Whitworth recaps a violent weekend of protests from Seattle to Richmond. And ABC News White House correspondent Rachel Scott checks in from Selma, Alabama, where the late Rep. John Lewis crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge for the final time. http://apple.co/2HPocUL
FiveThirtyEight Politics Podcast. The clock is ticking for states to make sure they can safely and effectively administer this November’s general election. In March, it became clear that states needed to reconfigure in-person voting and significantly scale up mail voting so that Americans could cast their ballots during the coronavirus pandemic. During the primaries, many voters experienced postponed elections, consolidated polling places, long lines, mail ballots that never reached them, and long delays in counting those ballots. In this installment of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, election attorney Myrna Pérez of the Brennan Center for Justice joins Galen Druke and Nathaniel Rakich to discuss how prepared states are for the general election, with only 100 days remaining. https://53eig.ht/3jALZ9T
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW TODAY
Download the ABC News app and select "The Note" as an item of interest to receive the day's sharpest political analysis.
The Note is a daily ABC News feature that highlights the key political moments of the day ahead. Please check back tomorrow for the latest.