The latest on the 2020 election

Vermont Gov. Phil Scott told reporters Friday that even though last night’s debate was better than the first, he is still not planning to vote for President Trump.  

"I want to again reinforce the fact that I am not voting for President Trump," said Scott, a Republican. "Who I am going to vote for, who I am going to write in, or vote for has yet to be determined."  

Scott said he hasn't decided whether he will vote in person or drop off his ballot early.  

He said he watched some of Thursday's night debate and was "appreciative that it was much better than the first one, although that was a fairly low bar." 

CNN previously reported that Scott announced in August he wouldn’t be voting for Trump.

President Trump commented on his calm performance at the final presidential debate, saying he “wanted to play by the rules.”

At one point during Thursday's debate, the President said he “took responsibility” for his handling of the pandemic, before immediately saying it wasn’t his fault.

Asked Friday if he still took responsibility, Trump responded, “I always take responsibility and I've done a great job and the people around me have done a great job.” 

He added that governors “had nothing on their shelves, and we stocked them. And those governors, if they're honest they’ll tell you it was the best job they've ever seen. I've had governance say it’s one of the best jobs they’ve ever seen anybody doing anything."

CNN's Randi Kaye spoke to three undecided voters to get their reaction to last night's debate.

The voters are from the key swing states of Ohio, Michigan and Florida, states that could be crucial for either candidate's victory.

Watch their reactions below:

Nearly half of the mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania have been returned, according to data provided by the secretary of state’s office.  

As of Friday, 1,449,400 ballots have been returned out of 2,940,210 ballot applications that have been approved.

Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar noted the significant surge in voting by mail this year over previous elections.

In the 2016 general election, 266,208 absentee ballots were cast statewide, according to Boockvar. 

The nearly 3 million mail-in applications the state has approved represents nearly a third of the roughly 9 million registered voters. 

President Trump is “in a great mood” and “very happy with his debate performance,” White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said Friday.

Asked if she felt it was enough to change the trajectory of the race, she responded that was never the President’s goal.

The press secretary pointed to early voting numbers, claiming “Republicans don't routinely match early vote of Democrats, and we're seeing that in states, and we believe that's more indicative of where the country stands.” McEnany was referring specifically to Michigan. Not every state releases the party affiliation of early voters.

She said that was a better indicator of the race than “any of the public polling out there that sometimes is designed to shape public opinion, rather than gauge it.”

Asked why the President continues to hold massive rallies with no social distancing and no mask requirement, McEnany said the American people “deserve to hear from their leaders,” and attacked Democratic rival Joe Biden for his lack of in-person campaign events.

“I think if you're going to not fight for the vote of the American people, I don't think you're going to fight for the American people as President,” she said.

Sen. Kamala Harris praised her running mate's debate performance after touching down in Atlanta for campaign events. 

“We had a good debate last night. We had a good debate. Joe did really well, and I’m really happy to be back in Atlanta, Georgia,” Harris told reporters after walking off her plane. 

Asked why she thinks her and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden can win Georgia when a Democratic nominee has not won the state since 1992, she said “the people of Georgia deserve to have a president who sees them, who cares about them. Georgia has been so hard hit by the pandemic."

"You’re looking at, nationally, almost half of Black businesses have permanently closed because of the failure of this administration to address the pandemic," she continued. "We’re looking at Atlanta which has a very significant Black community, and 1 in 1,000 Black people in America have died because of this pandemic. It is predicted as many as 1 in 500 by the end of the year. So we’re here to talk about what Joe and I are prepared to do."

Much like Biden did in last night's debate, Harris took a swipe at Trump and his response to the pandemic.

Asked about fracking, Harris said, “Let’s be really clear about this. Joe Biden is not going to ban fracking. He is going to deal with those subsidies, but the President likes to take everything out of context, so let’s be clear. What Joe was talking about was banning subsidies but he will not ban fracking in America.”

Minnesota has received at least 1,186,522 absentee ballots for the general election as of Friday, according to data posted by the secretary of state's office.

The previous high was 689,722 ballots in the 2016 general election.  

As of Friday, 1,765,327 ballot applications were requested, compared to 742,021 in 2016. 

The state currently has a little over 3.5 million registered voters, but this could change as voters can register in person through election day. 

Of those registered so far, approximately 34% have voted as of today.

Former Vice President Joe Biden and aligned Democratic committees maintained a substantial cash advantage of more than $107 million over President Trump and his political operation in the final weeks of the campaign, according to a new round of filings that capture last-minute fundraising and spending.

Here's what the reports show:

The President’s political operation has struggled to compete financially with Biden in recent months, and Trump has headed to high-dollar fundraising events to shore up his cash position in the waning days of the presidential campaign.

On Thursday – just hours before the final confrontation on the debate stage – Trump made an appearance at a Nashville fundraiser that was expected to bring in $8 million for the campaign.

The President insists, however, he has enough funds to prevail on Nov. 3 – as he did four years ago, despite being outspent by his then-rival Hillary Clinton.

“We don’t need money,” Trump said during Thursday night’s debate. “We have plenty of money. In fact, we beat Hillary Clinton with a tiny fraction of the money that she was able” to raise.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio fired back at claims President Trump made during last night's debate about the city being a “ghost town.”

De Blasio said his city is “fighting back” after once being the epicenter of the pandemic. He pointed out that 1,600 public schools are open and more than 10,000 restaurants are open and engaging in outdoor dining.

“Jobs are coming back” he said, but “it’s gonna be a long road.”

“I mean this is just a pitiful attempt by the President to undermine the notion that everyday people are going to fight back this disease because he failed to," de Blasio added.

The mayor accused Trump of putting the “burden” and “onus” on the “people who are suffering but are still fighting back, rather than acknowledging his responsibility because he wasn’t here for us when we needed testing, when we needed a stimulus for our recovery.” 

“He’s been missing in action,” de Blasio said. 

The mayor said Trump's “greatest fallacy” is that he “hasn’t lifted a finger for a stimulus.”

The mayor defended the city’s public school education protocols, saying the team looked globally at all the standards that worked and combined them into a “gold standard.” 

“We test constantly in our schools. We found an incredibly low rate of positive cases in our schools," de Blasio said.

But he added that operating schools safely requires a lot of resources, agreeing with Joe Biden’s comments on education needing funding. 

Responding to a question about the colder months ahead and the possibility of a resurgence, de Blasio said, “no we’re not seeing a second wave in NYC and we are fighting back any indication that might even suggest even the beginning of them.” 

“I’m feeling very good that we can get through this winter strong,” he said.