NewsNation Chief Washington Anchor and On Balance host Leland Vittert was a foreign correspondent for four years in Jerusalem. He gives you an early look at tonight’s 7 p.m. ET show. Subscribe to War Notes here.  

State of play: 

• 60 days to the election 
• 4 days to the debate set for Sept. 10
• Decision Desk HQ average: Kamala Harris +3.8, as of around 12 p.m. ET today. Click here to see the latest numbers.
  • PredictIt betting odds: 54 to 50 in favor of Harris

Disappeared

In proof you always worry about the wrong thing, the criminal cases against Donald Trump (and Hunter Biden) that were supposed to dominate the election cycle have effectively disappeared. 

• Look back: In August of 2023, Politico’s Playbook newsletter headlined, “Welcome to the courtroom campaign.”
• To be fair, they admitted today they — and most of Washington (including us) — got it wrong.
  • The sentencing in the “hush money” case in New York City has been delayed until after the election.
  • The Georgia election interference case, the only one of which would have been televised, blew up in Democrats’ faces because of the prosecutor’s affair.
  • Jack Smith’s Jan. 6 case is hopelessly (for Democrats) tied up in the Supreme Court’s immunity decision.
  • Jack Smith’s classified documents case is disintegrating. 
• And it’s not just Trump’s problems. Republicans planned to use Hunter Biden’s business, tax and prostitution (lifestyle) problems against his dad.
  • Well, that didn’t work. 

Important question: So if it’s not trials, what will define the 2024 race? We don’t know.

• White working-class voters defined 2016 by turning out in larger numbers for Trump
• Suburban women fed up with mean tweets defined 2020 
• What defines 2024?
  • Are we collectively undercounting the turnout of Black women?
  • What about the economic anger of college-educated whites who want to say they are voting for Harris but don’t believe she’s moved to the center or that taking on corporate price gouging is the root of all their problems?
    • Click here to see a must-watch interview with Harris’ spokesman.
      • “We don’t have time to sit around and think about why over the last few years certain things may have happened or may not have happened. We’ve got to go win an election.”
  • Will youth voters, who we keep hearing care about Israel and abortion, vote on the economy? Brookings thinks so.
  • Will Harris’ bet on reproductive freedoms expand the gender gap in a way we haven’t seen before?
  • Does Harris’ fundraising advantage (the campaign raised $361 million in August alone) just overwhelm Republicans?

Watch tonight: What will define the 2024 race? We’ll discuss it with Mark Penn. 

Watch This! If you watch one thing today — other than “On Balance” at 7 p.m. ET — click here to see the gubernatorial campaign launch video of Virginia’s lieutenant governor.  

• Spoiler alert: She’s a Republican — she’s also a female Black Republican and, if elected, would be America’s first-ever Black female governor
  • For all the focus on Harris’ race and gender
  • For all the talking points that Harris’ race and gender somehow are uniquely qualifying …
  • Why doesn’t anyone care about Winsome Earle-Sears’ diversity as her strength? 

To be fair: This isn’t new. After her election as lieutenant governor under Glenn Youngkin, the media largely ignored her. 

Political reality: She’s a Republican running in a D +10 state in the off-year Virginia election — but she’ll have Youngkin’s legacy. 

• Right now, Youngkin’s 59% approval rating makes him one of the most popular governors in the country 

Finally Progress

The arrest of Colin Gray — the father of alleged school shooter Colt Gray — represents a HUGE step forward in stopping school shootings. 

• Less than 30 minutes before the Georgia Bureau of Investigation announced the arrest, civil rights attorney Robert Patillo predicted it on our air. 
• Colin Gray allegedly gave his son an AR-15 for Christmas after the young man made threats.
  • It’s difficult to reconcile that fact.
    • Then add this quote from his aunt in The Washington Post: “He ‘was begging for help from everybody around him,’ Annie Brown, the aunt, told The Washington Post. ‘The adults around him failed him.’”
    • Giving the younger Gray a weapon of any kind appears criminal. 

Zoom out: Guns in America are a fact of life — just like apple pie and July 4 fireworks. 

• The “common sense” gun laws demanded after every school shooting — even if enforced perfectly — wouldn’t stop many shootings. 
• The decision in 36 hours to charge Gray’s father should change the calculus of so many parents.
  • The Washington Post ends its story on the charges by saying, “Prosecutors and law enforcement officials across the country who are struggling to grapple with gun violence will likely watch the Georgia prosecution closely to see how it plays out, legally and politically, in a state with loose firearms laws and a pro-gun culture.”
    • What they leave out:
      • Trump won more than three-fourths of the vote in Jackson County — it’s as red as you get. 
      • The irony that the swiftest charges ever against a school shooter’s parents came from prosecutors in a Republican state in a deep red Republican district appears lost on the Post.

Reality Check

Tim Walz’s statements on Israel, Gaza and the pro-Hamas protesters in America should shake us to our core.

• Among them, he demands that what’s happening in Gaza stop.
• Does that mean Israel needs to stop trying to rescue its hostages? 
• Or Hamas needs to stop brutalizing its own people? 
• Next, he says the answer is a two-state solution?
  • The same two-state solution that Palestinians have rejected over and over 
  • And now polling shows the Palestinian people don’t support living in peace with their Jewish neighbors 

The latest protests, including this one in New York City, have absolutely NOTHING to do with dying Palestinian children in Gaza — it’s rank hatred of Jews. Democrats whitewashing and ignoring it is appalling. 

What about the Women?

It never ceases to amaze me how the most vocal voices for women’s rights care so little about the female hostages getting raped in Gaza, the women of Afghanistan, girls forced to wear hijabs in Iran.  

The New York Times reports on what Afghanistan looks like now for women — dear god. 

Fair question for Harris: Now that women can’t talk in public under Taliban rule, do you still believe the Afghanistan withdrawal was a good idea? 

Panic Button

New York retailers must now install panic buttons because of all the thefts. 

Fair question: Wouldn’t it be easier just to lock up the people committing all the crimes? What exactly will police do when they arrive after a panic alarm is pushed? 

Tune into “On Balance with Leland Vittert” weeknights at 7/6C on NewsNation. Find your channel here. 

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and not necessarily of NewsNation.