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Presidential candidates make pitch to Black voters in North Carolina

North Carolina is one of seven so-called swing states that could determine the next U.S. president. Kamala Harris, Donald Trump and their surrogates have spent a lot of time campaigning in this southern state. Black Americans make up 22% of the population, and those voters could decide who gets North Carolina’s 16 Electoral College votes. Rafael Saakov has the story, narrated by Anna Rice. Videographer: Aleksandr Bergan
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California attempts to regulate election deepfakes

The state of California has passed several laws attempting to regulate artificial intelligence, including AI used to create realistic looking but manipulated audio or video — known as a deepfake. In this U.S. election season, the aim is to counter misinformation. But it has raised concerns about free speech. From California, Genia Dulot has our story.
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Georgia 2024: Inside a critical battleground state

Georgia appeared to be on track to elect former U.S. President Donald Trump earlier in the 2024 presidential campaign when President Joe Biden was still in the race. But Vice President Kamala Harris has put the state back into play for Democrats.
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US voters facing ‘heightened and dynamic’ threat landscape

Tuesday’s US presidential election is shaping up to be unlike any the country has seen before. Security and intelligence officials warn that voters are facing a heightened and dynamic threat environment, with dangers coming from both home and abroad. VOA National Security Correspondent Jeff Seldin has more.
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Most Americans can vote before Election Day

More than 300,000 people in the state of Georgia cast their ballots for U.S. president on the first day of voting in the battleground state. These people were among the millions of Americans who are eligible to vote before Election Day, November 5.
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Supreme Court allows Pennsylvania to count contested ballots

DOYLESTOWN, Pennsylvania — The Supreme Court on Friday rejected an emergency appeal from Republicans that could have led to thousands of provisional ballots not being counted in Pennsylvania as the presidential campaigns vie in the final days before the election in the nation’s biggest battleground state. 

The justices left in place a state Supreme Court ruling that elections officials must count provisional ballots cast by voters whose mail-in ballots were rejected. 

The ruling is a victory for voting-rights advocates, who had sought to force counties — primarily Republican-controlled counties — to let voters cast provisional ballots on Election Day if they had realized that their mail-in ballots were to be rejected for various garden-variety errors. 

As of Thursday, about 9,000 ballots out of more than 1.6 million returned had arrived at elections offices around Pennsylvania lacking a secrecy envelope, a signature or a date, according to state records. 

Pennsylvania is the biggest presidential election battleground this year, with 19 electoral votes, and is expected to play an outsized role in deciding the election between Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Kamala Harris. 

It was decided by tens of thousands of votes in 2016 when Trump won it and again in 2020 when Democrat Joe Biden won it. 

The ruling came as voters had their last chance Friday to apply for  mail-in ballots in a bellwether suburban Philadelphia county, while a county  across the state gave voters who didn’t receive their ballots in the mail another chance to get them. 

A judge in Erie County, in Pennsylvania’s northwestern corner, ruled Friday in a lawsuit brought by the Democratic Party that about 15,000 people who applied for mail ballots but didn’t receive them may go to the county elections office and get replacements through Monday. 

The deadline to apply for a mail-in ballot has passed in Pennsylvania. But the judge’s ruling means that Erie County’s elections office will be open every day through Monday for voters to go in, cancel the mail-in ballots they didn’t receive in the mail, and get ballots over the counter. 

In suburban Philadelphia’s Bucks County, a court set a deadline of 5 p.m. Friday for voters there to apply for and receive mail-in ballots. 

Lines outside the county’s elections office in Doylestown were long throughout the day — snaking down the sidewalk — with the process taking about two hours by Friday afternoon. 

Nakesha McGuirk, 44, a Democrat from Bensalem, sized up the line and said: “I did not expect the line to be this long. But I’m going to stick it out.” 

She faces a long work commute next week and worried about her ability to make it to the polls on Election Day. “I figured that rather than run into the risk of not getting home in time to go and vote, that it would be better to just do it this way early,” said McGuirk, a Harris supporter. 

Republican voter Patrick Lonieski, a Trump supporter from Buckingham, also found it more convenient with his work schedule to vote Friday in a county he called “pivotal” to the outcome. 

“I just want to make sure I get my ballot in, and it’s counted,” said Lonieski, 62, who was joined by his 18-year-old son, voting for the first time. 

The line steadily dwindled as 5 p.m. approached. One last straggler broke into a run to make it by the deadline as elections workers cheerfully counted down the seconds. “Let’s go! Hurry up! You can do it!” a bystander yelled. People broke into applause as she walked through the door — just in time. 

A Bucks County judge had ordered the three-day extension in response to a Trump campaign lawsuit alleging that voters faced disenfranchisement when they were turned away by county application-processing offices that had struggled to keep up with demand, leading to frustration and anger among voters. 
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What US election results could mean for Africa

JOHANNESBURG — Whoever U.S. voters choose as their next president — former President Donald Trump or Vice President Kamala Harris — the election has global implications, with the probability it will affect other economies, foreign conflicts and personal freedoms, analysts told VOA.

South African independent political analyst Asanda Ngoasheng said the winner could usher in policies that affect ordinary people in Africa.

“I hope that as Americans vote, they’re aware that whatever decision they make, it’s going to determine the future of not only America but the rest of the world,” she said.

“How we engage with issues of termination of pregnancy, how we engage with issues of LGBT rights, how we engage with issues of race and racism will be determined by this election, not just for America but for everyone else and everywhere else in the world,” Ngoasheng continued.

The abortion issue is a particularly divisive topic for U.S. Republicans and Democrats.

While the United States is the largest funder of global reproductive health programs, Trump slashed that funding during his presidency by extending a policy that barred U.S. aid from going to any organization that supported abortion.

Experts said they believe that a second Trump presidency would likely do that again and could negatively affect PEPFAR, the U.S.’s key HIV/AIDS program.

Trade is another key area in which analysts think Harris and Trump would differ, given Trump’s “America first” policy.

African governments hope that next year the U.S. will renew the African Growth and Opportunity Act, a Clinton-era policy that gives countries duty-free access to the U.S. market.

Ray Hartley, research director of South African Brenthurst Foundation think tank, does not have high hopes for a second Trump presidency.

“I think that a Trump presidency would reinforce America’s isolationist approach in international affairs, and that might not be good for trade,” he said.

Other analysts said they believe general U.S. policy toward Africa won’t differ radically regardless of who wins.

They said that while Africa was often neglected in terms of U.S. foreign policy, that has shifted in recent years amid renewed competition with Russia and China on the resource-rich continent.

Moscow has strengthened military ties with many African governments, while U.S. troops have been kicked out of Niger and Chad. Beijing, meanwhile, is Africa’s largest trade partner and has been building infrastructure throughout the continent.

Ebenezer Obadare, senior fellow for Africa studies at U.S. research organization  Council on Foreign Relations, said, “Insofar as the United States is intent on competing with those powers in Africa, keeping its old alliances and building new ones, I don’t think one administration is likely to differ much from another, strictly in terms of their Africa policy.”

As vice president, Harris traveled to the continent, where she pushed President Joe Biden’s line that the U.S. was “all in on Africa.” The Biden administration also started holding an annual U.S.-African leaders’ summit.

And, as it increases competition with China, the current administration has also undertaken funding the biggest U.S. infrastructure project in Africa in generations: the Lobito corridor, a railway connecting Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo that will be used to transport critical minerals.

Biden was forced to reschedule a promised visit to Africa and is now expected in Angola in December. The choice of country has been criticized by some for what they say is Angola’s shoddy human rights record.

Trump’s signature initiative involving the continent was creating Prosper Africa, a U.S. agency designed to assist American companies doing business in Africa.

However, he also offended many Africans during his first term, using a derogatory term to refer to countries on the continent and mispronouncing Namibia’s name. More recently he raised ire by comparing himself to South African icon Nelson Mandela.

Analysts said that while Harris and Trump have generally ignored Africa over the course of their campaigns, whoever becomes America’s next president would do well to keep up engagement with the continent, which boasts the world’s youngest population.
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Elon Musk loses bid to move $1 million voter prizes case

A U.S. judge on Friday denied Elon Musk’s bid to move a Pennsylvania lawsuit over his $1 million voter prizes to federal court, moving the case back to state court.

It was not immediately clear if the decision would affect the billionaire’s plan to keep awarding money until the U.S. presidential election Tuesday.

The decision was issued by U.S. District Judge Gerald Pappert in Philadelphia federal court.

Musk has been giving $1 million checks to randomly selected registered voters who sign a petition supporting free speech and gun rights.

Musk’s America PAC had awarded $1 million prizes to 14 people as of Friday and said the final prize will be given out Tuesday.

Democratic Philadelphia District Attorney Lawrence Krasner sued Musk and his political action committee, which backs Republican former President Donald Trump, on Monday in a state court to try to block the giveaway. Krasner called the program an illegal lottery.

Two days later, Tesla CEO Musk and his America PAC sought to move the case to federal court, arguing Krasner’s lawsuit raised questions about free-speech rights and election interference that belong in federal court. That prompted the state judge who had been overseeing the case to put it on hold.

In arguing that the case belonged in state court, Krasner called Musk’s maneuver an attempt to “run the clock until Election Day.” Krasner did not allege the giveaway violates federal law.

Philadelphia is the largest city in Pennsylvania, one of seven battleground states likely to determine the outcome of the race between Trump and his Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris.

Musk’s offer is limited to registered voters in the seven states expected to decide the election — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

Musk gave away the first $1 million at an October 19 America PAC rally in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania’s state capital.

The giveaway falls in a gray area of election law, and legal experts are divided on whether Musk could be violating federal laws against paying people to register to vote.

The U.S. Department of Justice warned America PAC the giveaway could violate federal law, according to media reports, but federal prosecutors have not taken any public action.

Musk has so far given nearly $120 million to America PAC, according to federal disclosures.
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Pennsylvania’s Erie County is pivotal in presidential race 

Erie, Pennsylvania — During next Tuesday’s election, a lot of nervous voters, pollsters and campaign officials will be paying close attention to Erie County in Pennsylvania, which has chosen the victor in the past four presidential contests.

Over the past decade, the margins between the winner and loser have tightened, reflecting the national trend of closer elections. That is perhaps no big surprise. After all, bellwether “Erie County is such a microcosm of the entire nation,” said Jeff Bloodworth, a history professor at Gannon University in downtown Erie.

Erie County, the largest county by area in the state, is “slightly whiter, it’s slightly poorer and it’s slightly less educated than the average in Pennsylvania,” explained Bloodworth.

Both the Democratic and Republican party presidential nominees campaigned here in the closing weeks of the race.

“Erie County, you are a pivot county. How you all vote in presidential elections often ends up predicting the national result,” Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democrat, informed a recent rally at the Erie Insurance Arena.

Former president Donald Trump, the Republican, during his appearance at the Bayfront Convention Center, told the crowd, “I’m here in Erie, Pennsylvania, with the workers who used to be Democrats, but now they’re all Trump Republicans because they know that Trump is going to take them to the Promised Land.”

Democrats traditionally prevail in the city limits. But the party is not taking anything for granted — pushing for maximum turnout in both the city and the county.

“We’re past the persuasion point and it’s a matter of getting our base voters out to vote, and nothing works better than a knock at the door and face-to-face contact,” said local party chairman Sam Talarico.

The visits to Erie by the presidential contenders “do make a difference as far as enthusiasm goes,” according to Talarico.

With the lead in polling going back and forth and possibly unreliable in such a tight contest, “the only thing we can rely on is enthusiasm, and we know that the enthusiasm in Erie County is off the charts,” added Talarico.

It is in the more rural communities of Erie County where Republicans are strongest.

Harold Ross has been knocking on doors in Erie County and neighboring Warren County, where he lives, on behalf of Trump.

“You knock on a door, and you don’t know what you’re going to walk into. You could walk into a hardliner — a Democrat. You kind of try to stay neutral with it because you don’t want to make it look pushy,” explained Ross, wearing a shirt displaying the former president’s mugshot of when he was arrested in 2023 in Georgia after being accused of trying to illegally overturn the outcome of the 2020 election.

“I’ve run into Democrats who actually tell me they’re flipping — that they’re going to vote for Donald Trump,” said Ross.

Linda Pezzino manages the Trump campaign office in the town of Corry. Pezzino said she had been experiencing sleepless nights worrying about Trump’s fate in the election.

“All of a sudden something came over me and I said, ‘He won. He’s winning. He’s going to win Pennsylvania,’” Pezzino recalled.

Erie experienced a long period of being on the losing side — regardless of the party in power. Jobs and people left as factories closed and Pennsylvania became part of America’s Rust Belt.

A renaissance is attracting recreational tourism with activities from boating to wine tasting.

Overseeing a second generation of family vineyards is Mario Mazza. His father and uncle were immigrants from Italy and grew the family business, nestled along the shore of Lake Erie, over more than half a century into one that has more than 240 hectares under grape and grain cultivation.

Some in the county, according to Mazza, are fatigued by all the attention paid to voters by the presidential campaigns.

“I don’t know anyone who is soaking it up and basking in the amount of attention,” he said.

Mazza said he wanted to hear more pragmatism and nuances of policy from the presidential campaigns and less of the pithy soundbites and inflammatory language, especially on an issue critical to his industry — immigrant labor.

“Without labor, the agricultural machine in this country will grind to a halt. And I think anybody in agriculture knows that. Anybody in the food supply chain knows and realizes that,” Mazza said, standing at the edge of a field of recently harvested grape vines behind the family’s main Mediterranean-style rustic winery in the borough of North East township.

The winery is more upscale than the typical casual places to grab a quick meal that dot the city of Erie, a half-hour drive southwest.

At La Cocina Coqui, customers stream in for their lunchtime takeout orders of plantain sandwiches and empanadillas. Many are Spanish speakers, craving the Puerto Rican-inspired dishes of owner Leida Rodriguez.

An influx of Hispanics, especially those from Puerto Rico or whose parents were born in that Caribbean territory of the United States, has helped offset Erie’s population decline in recent years.

Rodriguez said, in this election season, her customers also hunger for a president who will devour inflation.

“The cost of food. The rent is going up in here. They’re just looking at stuff like that — who would help out,” she says during a brief break from the small restaurant’s kitchen.

Democrats’ edge in voter registration and their campaign organization here would seem to give Harris the advantage, but Professor Bloodworth said that assumption may be outdated.

“Before Trump, you would look at this and go ‘The Democrats are going to win. They’re organized. They have a dozen paid staffers in a county of 200,000. That just has to be meaningful.’ Unless it’s not, because Donald Trump has kind of changed the rules of American politics.”

Democrats and Republicans in Erie County appear to agree on only one thing right now — they are on edge because of the high stakes ahead of Election Day in this must-win county in a must-win state.
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Pennsylvania’s Erie County pivotal in presidential race

In Tuesday’s U.S. presidential election, a lot of eyes will be on Erie County, Pennsylvania, where voters have chosen the winner of the past four presidential contests. During the past decade, the margins between the winner and loser have tightened. VOA’s chief national correspondent Steve Herman reports from Erie, Pennsylvania.
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Kurdish immigrants running for local office in Minnesota

Moorhead, Minnesota, is home to more than 3,000 Kurds, some of whom have been there since the mid-1970s. They are the town’s largest minority group and hope this election might bring them representation in local government. Dakhil Shammo of VOA’s Kurdish service went to Minnesota and met with two local candidates in this story narrated by Amy Katz.
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Jitters in Europe ahead of US elections

Europe is bracing for former President Donald Trump’s potential return to power — even as his Democratic rival, Vice President Kamala Harris, remains a mostly unknown quantity. Many Europeans believe much is at stake in the nail-biting U.S. elections: from NATO and the transatlantic alliance to Russia’s war on Ukraine, trade relations and the future of their own democracies. Lisa Bryant reports from Paris. 
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College athletes push for voter turnout while largely avoiding controversy as election nears

Lily Meskers faced an unexpected choice in the lead-up to the first major election she can vote in.

The 19-year-old University of Montana sprinter was among college athletes in the state who received an inquiry from Montana Together asking if she was interested in a name, image and likeness deal to support Sen. Jon Tester, a three-term Democrat seeking re-election. The group, which is not affiliated with the Tester campaign, offered from $400 to $2,400 to athletes willing to produce video endorsements.

Meskers, who is from Colorado but registered to vote in Montana, decided against the deal because she disagrees with Tester’s votes on legislation involving transgender athletes in sports.

“I was like, OK, I believe that this is a political move to try to gain back some voters that he might have lost,” Meskers said. “And me being a female student-athlete myself, I was not going to give my endorsement to someone who I felt didn’t have the same support for me.”

Professional athletes such as LeBron James, Colin Kaepernick and Stephen Curry have taken high-profile stances on hot-button topics and political campaigns in recent years, but college athletes are far less outspoken — even if money is available, according to experts in the NIL field. Being outwardly political can reflect on their school or endanger potential endorsement deals from brands that don’t want controversy. It can certainly establish a public image for an athlete — for better or for worse — or lead to tensions with teammates and coaches who might not feel the same way.

There are examples of political activism by college athletes: A Texas Tech kicker revealed his support for former President Donald Trump on a shirt under his uniform at a game last week and a handful of Nebraska athletes a few days ago teamed up in a campaign ad against an abortion measure on the Tuesday’s ballot.

Still, such steps are considered rare.

“It can be viewed as risky and there may be people telling them just don’t even take that chance because they haven’t made it yet,” said Lauren Walsh, who started a sports branding agency 15 years ago. She said there is often too much to lose for themselves, their handlers and in some cases, their families.

“And these individuals still have to figure out what they’re going to do with the rest of their lives, even those that do end up getting drafted,” she added.

College coaches are not always as reticent. Auburn men’s basketball coach Bruce Pearl has used social media to make it clear he does not support Kamala Harris, Trump’s Democratic opponent in next week’s presidential election. Oklahoma State football coach Mike Gundy once caused a stir with a star player for wearing a shirt promoting a far-right news outlet.

Blake Lawrence, co-founder of the NIL platform Opendorse, noted that this is the first presidential election in the NIL era, which began in July 2021. He said athletes are flocking to opportunities to help increase voter turnout in the 18-to-24 age demographic, adding that one of his company’s partners has had 86 athletes post social media messages encouraging turnout through the first half of the week. 

He said athletes are shying away from endorsing specific candidates or causes that are considered partisan.

“Student-athletes are, for the most part, still developing their confidence in endorsing any type of product or service,” he said. “So if they are hesitant to put their weight behind supporting a local restaurant or an e-commerce product, then they are certainly going to be hesitant to use their social channels in a political way.”

Giving athletes a voice

Many college athletes have opted to focus on drumming up turnout in a non-partisan manner or simply using their platforms to take stands that are not directly political in nature. Some of those efforts can be found in battleground states.

A progressive group called NextGen America said it had signed players in Arizona, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Virginia to encourage voting among young people. Another organization, The Team, said it prepped 27 college athletes in Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Arizona and Michigan to lead volunteer voter participation opportunities for students. The organization also said it got more than 625 coaches to sign a nonpartisan pledge to get their athletes registered to vote.

The Team’s executive director is Joe Kennedy, a former coach who coordinated championship visits and other sporting events at the White House during President Barack Obama’s administration. In early October, it hosted a Zoom event during which panelists such as NCAA President Charlie Baker and WNBA players Nneka Ogwumike and Natasha Cloud gave college athletes advice about using their platforms on campus.

In its early days, The Team seized upon momentum from the record turnout seen in the 2020 election. The NCAA that year said Division I athletes could have Election Day off from practice and play to vote. Lisa Kay Solomon, founder of the All Vote No Play campaign, said even if the athletes don’t immediately take stands on controversial issues, it’s important for them to learn how.

“It is a lot to ask our young people to feel capable and confident on skills they’ve never had a chance to practice,” Solomon said. “We have to model what it means to practice taking risks, practice standing up for yourself, practice pausing to think about what are the values that you care about — not what social media is feeding into your brain, but what do you care about and how do you express that? And how do you do it in a way that honors the kind of future that you want to be a part of?”

Shut up and play?

Two years ago, Tennessee-Martin quarterback Dresser Winn said he would support a candidate in a local district attorney general race in what experts said was very likely the first political NIL deal by a college athlete.

There have been very few since.

The public criticism and fallout for athletes who speak out on politics or social issue can be sharp. Kaepernick, the Super Bowl-winning quarterback of the San Francisco 49ers, hasn’t played in an NFL game since January 2017, not long after he began kneeling during the national anthem at games.

Meskers, the Montana sprinter, said political endorsements through NIL deals could create problems for athletes and their schools.

“I just think that NIL is going to run into a lot of trouble and a lot of struggles if they continue to let athletes do political endorsements,” she said. “I just think it’s messy. But I stand by NIL as a whole. I think it’s really hard as a student athlete to create a financial income and support yourself.”

Walsh said it’s easier for wealthy and veteran stars like James and Ogwumike to take stands. James, the Los Angeles Lakers star, started More Than a Vote — an organization with a mission to “educate, energize and protect Black voters” — in 2020. He has passed the leadership to Ogwumike, who just finished her 13th year in the WNBA and also is the president of the Women’s National Basketball Players Association. More than a Vote is focused on women’s rights and reproductive freedom this year.

“They have very established brands,” Walsh said. “They know who they are and they know what their political stance is. They know that they have a really strong following that — there’s always going to be haters, but they’re also always going to have that strong following of people who listen to everything that they have to say.”

Andra Gillespie, an associate professor at Emory University who teaches African American politics, also said it is rare that a college athlete would make a significant impact with a political stand simply because they tend to have a more regional platform than national. Even celebrities like Taylor Swift and Eminem are better at increasing turnout than championing candidates.

“They are certainly very beneficial in helping to drive up turnout among their fans,” Gillespie said. “The data is less conclusive about whether or not they’re persuasive – are they the ones who are going to persuade you to vote for a particular candidate?”

Athletes as influencers

Still, campaigns know young voters are critical this election cycle, and athletes offer an effective and familiar voice to reach them.

Political and social topics are not often broached, but this week six Nebraska athletes — five softball players and a volleyball player — appeared in an ad paid for by the group Protect Women and Children involving two initiatives about abortion laws on Tuesday’s ballot.

The female athletes backed Initiative 434, which would amend the state constitution to prohibit abortions after the first trimester, with exceptions. Star softball player Jordy Bahl said on social media that the athletes were not paid.

A University of Montana spokesperson said two athletes initially agreed to take part in the NIL deal backing Tester. The school said one withdrew and the other declined to be interviewed.

For Meskers, deciding against the offer boiled down to Tester twice voting against proposals to bar federal funds from going to schools that allow transgender athletes to play women’s sports, a prominent GOP campaign topic. Tester’s campaign said the proposals were amendments to government spending packages, and he didn’t want to play a role in derailing them as government shutdowns loomed.

“As a former public school teacher and school board member, Jon Tester believes these decisions should be made at the local level,” a Tester spokesperson said. “He has never voted to allow men to compete against women.”

Meskers said she believes using influence as college athletes is good and she is in favor of NIL. She just doesn’t think the two should mix specifically for supporting candidates.

“I think especially as student athletes, we do have such a big voice and we do have a platform to use,” she said. “So I think if you’re encouraging people to do their civic duties and get up and go (vote), I think that’s a great thing.” 
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Kurdish immigrants run for local office in Minnesota

Moorhead, Minnesota, is home to more than 3,000 Kurds, some of whom have been there since the mid-1970s. They are the town’s largest minority group and hope this election might bring them representation in local government. Dakhil Shammo of VOA’s Kurdish service went to Minnesota and met with two local candidates in this story narrated by Amy Katz.
Camera: Kawar Farok
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Hurricane damage, arson attacks add complexity to US elections

With voting underway in a tightly contested presidential race, election officials in the U.S. are facing additional challenges in the state of North Carolina, where a hurricane ravaged communities, and in the states of Washington and Oregon, where there have been arson attacks on ballot boxes. With Deborah Bloom and Rafael Saakov, Natasha Mozgovaya has the story. Camera: Deborah Bloom and Alexander Bergan.
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Trump sues US television network for $10 billion over Harris interview

washington — Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump sued CBS News on Thursday over an interview of Vice President Kamala Harris that aired on the network’s “60 Minutes” news program this month.

The lawsuit, filed in federal court in the Northern District of Texas, alleged that the network aired two different responses from Harris responding to a question about the Israel-Hamas war.

The version that aired during the “60 Minutes” program on October 6 did not include what the lawsuit referred to as a “word salad” response from Harris about the Biden administration’s influence on Israel’s conduct of the war.

The lawsuit follows Trump’s threats to revoke CBS’s broadcasting license if elected.

Trump’s campaign and office did not immediately reply to VOA’s email requesting comment.

The suit called for a jury trial and about $10 billion in damages, the filing showed. It alleges violations of a Texas law that prohibits deceptive acts in the conduct of business.

A CBS News spokesperson told VOA that “Trump’s repeated claims against 60 Minutes are false” and that the interview was not doctored.

“60 MINUTES fairly presented” the interview “to inform the viewing audience, and not to mislead it,” the spokesperson said in an email. “The lawsuit Trump has brought today against CBS is completely without merit and we will vigorously defend against it.”

In a statement earlier this month, CBS said “60 Minutes” gave an excerpt of the Harris interview to “Face the Nation” that used a longer section of her answer than what was aired on “60 Minutes.”

“Same question. Same answer. But a different portion of the response,” the statement said. “The portion of her answer on ’60 Minutes’ was more succinct, which allows time for other subjects in a wide-ranging, 21-minute-long segment.”

And in a letter to Trump’s legal counsel earlier this month, CBS said Trump has no legal basis to sue over the interview, CNN reported.

Trump had also agreed to give an interview to “60 Minutes” before ultimately backing out.

Clayton Weimers, the head of the U.S. office of Reporters Without Borders, dismissed the lawsuit as a publicity stunt.

“The lawsuit itself looks like a publicity stunt, but it reinforces the very real threats that Trump has issued to use the U.S. government to punish media outlets he doesn’t like should he regain the White House,” Weimers told VOA.

Some information for this report came from Reuters.
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