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Inspiring athletes take the 'Polar Plunge' for Special Olympics PA

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Inspiring athletes take the 'Polar Plunge' for Special Olympics PA


PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania (WPVI) — “I got involved with Special Olympics, finding something to do on a Saturday morning,” said athlete Emmett Abdo from Philadelphia. “I do soccer, swimming, basketball, and tennis. And today, I’m taking the plunge.”

Inspiring athletes like Emmett Abdo joined hundreds in braving the cold to fundraise for Special Olympics Pennsylvania.

It was the 9th annual Philadelphia Polar Plunge, which took place at Citizens Bank Park.

On Friday, teachers and students took the plunge inside the ballpark. On Saturday, athletes, coaches, police officers, volunteers and more braved the cold at the corner of Citizens Bank Way and Pattison Avenue.

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The event raised upwards of $400,000 for Special Olympics Pennsylvania.

Watch the video above to see all the action and hear more in Emmett Abdo’s words.

To learn more about Special Olympics Pennsylvania, visit their website.

Special Olympics athletes tee off at national golf championship in South Jersey

Athletes like Michael Dirkes are taking big swings towards greatness at the 22nd Annual Special Olympics North America Golf Championship.

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VP Kamala Harris, former President Donald Trump put focus on Pennsylvania on eve of 2024 election

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VP Kamala Harris, former President Donald Trump put focus on Pennsylvania on eve of 2024 election


What to Know

  • The focus is on Pennsylvania’s 19 electoral votes as both Republican former President Donald Trump and Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris work to get out the vote the day before Election Day.
  • Harris will spend all of Monday in Pennsylvania, whose 19 electoral votes offer the largest prize among the states expected to determine the Electoral College outcome.
  • Donald Trump makes four stops in three states, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Michigan. He’ll end in Grand Rapids, where he completed his first two campaigns.

A presidential campaign that has careened through a felony trial, an incumbent president being pushed off the ticket and multiple assassination attempts comes down to a final push across a handful of states on the eve of Election Day.

Kamala Harris will spend all of Monday in Pennsylvania, whose 19 electoral votes offer the largest prize among the states expected to determine the Electoral College outcome. The vice president and Democratic nominee will visit working-class areas including Allentown and end with a late-night Philadelphia rally that includes Lady Gaga and Oprah Winfrey.

Allentown public schools were closed due to the Kamala rally that’s “expected to draw large crowds, heavy traffic, and potential disruptions that may impact the safety and security of our students and staff,” the Lehigh Valley school district said.

Donald Trump plans four rallies in three states, beginning in Raleigh, North Carolina and stopping twice in Pennsylvania with events in Reading and Pittsburgh. The Republican nominee and former president ends his campaign the way he ended the first two, with a late Monday night event in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

About 77 million Americans already have voted early, but Harris and Trump are pushing to turn out many millions more supporters on Tuesday. Either result on Election Day will yield a historic outcome.

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A Trump victory would make him the first incoming president to have been indicted and convicted of a felony, after his hush-money trial in New York. He will gain the power to end other federal investigations pending against him. Trump would also become the second president in history to win non-consecutive White House terms, after Grover Cleveland in the late 19th century.

Harris is vying to become the first woman, first Black woman and first person of South Asian descent to reach the Oval Office, four years after she broke the same barriers in national office by becoming President Joe Biden’s second in command.

The vice president ascended to the top of the Democratic ticket after Biden’s disastrous performance in a June debate set into motion his withdrawing from the race. That was just one of a series of convulsions that have hit this year’s campaign.

Trump survived by millimeters a would-be assassin’s bullet at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. His Secret Service detail foiled a second attempt in September when a gunman had set up a rifle as Trump golfed at one of his courses in Florida.

Harris, 60, has played down the historic nature of her candidacy, which materialized only after the 81-year-old president ended his reelection bid after his June debate against the 78-year-old Trump accentuated questions about Biden’s age.

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Instead, Harris has pitched herself as a generational change, emphasized her support for abortion rights after the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision ending the constitutional right to abortion services, and regularly noted the former president’s role in the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. Assembling a coalition ranging from progressives like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York to Republican former Vice President Dick Cheney, Harris has called Trump a threat to democracy and late in the campaign even embraced the critique that Trump is accurately described as a “fascist.”

Heading into Monday, Harris has mostly stopped mentioning Trump. She is promising to solve problems and seek consensus, while sounding an almost exclusively optimistic tone reminiscent of her campaign’s opening days when she embraced “the politics of joy” and the campaign theme “Freedom.”

“From the very start, our campaign has not been about being against something, it is about being for something,” Harris said Sunday evening at Michigan State University.

Trump, renewing his “Make America Great Again” and “America First” slogans, has made his hard-line approach to immigration and withering criticisms of Harris and Biden the anchors of his argument for a second administration. He’s hammered Democrats for an inflationary economy, and he’s pledged to lead an economic “golden age,” end international conflicts and seal the U.S. southern border.

But Trump also has veered often into grievances over being prosecuted after trying to overturn Biden’s victory and repeatedly denigrated the country he wants to lead again as a “failed nation.” As recently as Sunday, he renewed his false claims that U.S. elections are rigged against him, mused about violence against journalists and said he “shouldn’t have left” the White House in 2021 — dark turns that have overshadowed another anchor of his closing argument: “Kamala broke it. I will fix it.”

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The election is likely to be decided across seven states. Trump won Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin in 2016 only to see them flip to Biden in 2020. North Carolina, Georgia, Arizona and Nevada add the Sun Belt swath of the presidential battleground map.

Trump won North Carolina twice and lost Nevada twice. He won Arizona and Georgia in 2016 but saw them slip to Democrats in 2020.

Harris’ team has projected confidence in recent days, pointing to a large gender gap in early voting data and research showing late-deciding voters have broken her way. They also believe in the strength of their campaign infrastructure. This weekend, the Harris campaign had more than 90,000 volunteers helping turn out voters — and knocked on more than 3 million doors across the battleground states. Still, Harris aides have insisted she remains the underdog.

Trump’s team has projected confidence, as well, arguing that the former president’s populist appeal will attract younger and working-class voters across racial and ethnic lines. The idea is that Trump can amass an atypical Republican coalition, even as other traditional GOP blocks — notably college-educated voters — become more Democratic.

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Trump campaign rallies across Pennsylvania as Election Day approaches

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Trump campaign rallies across Pennsylvania as Election Day approaches


PENNSYLVANIA (WPVI) — The Trump campaign rallied in two counties across Pennsylvania on Sunday as they tried to garner more support in the critical swing state before voters cast their ballots.

“A very, very special hello to Pennsylvania. What a great place,” former President Donald Trump said to a crowd of supporters at the Lancaster Airport in Lititz.

“November 5 will be the most important day in the history of our country, and together we will make America powerful again,” said Trump.

Trump spoke about strengthening the country as president while taking aim at the Democratic Party and journalists.

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RELATED | With Election Day nearing, candidates continue campaigning across Pennsylvania

At one point, he referred to the bulletproof glass surrounding him and said he wouldn’t mind if someone shot through the reporters.

“We have this piece of glass here, but all we have over here is the fake news. And to get me, somebody would have to shoot through the fake news, and I don’t mind that so much,” he noted.

Trump’s campaign team defended his remarks by saying, “he was making a joke.”

In Delaware County, Senator JD Vance took the stage at Sun Center Studios in Aston.

“Pennsylvania, are we ready to take this country in a different direction? Are we ready to make Donald Trump the next president of the United States?” said Vance.

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YOUR VOICE, YOUR VOTE | Check out 6abc’s Voter Guide for the upcoming presidential election

“I think a lot of energy is on Trump’s side; seems like the momentum is on Trump’s side,” said Ron Poliquin who drove to the event from Dover, Delaware.

Vance focused on key issues including the economy, immigration, border security, and crime.

“I feel like Trump and Vance really do care about the everyday person and actual Americans and not their personal agenda,” said Maria Poliquin from Dover, Delaware.

“Here is my message to Kamala Harris: We are not garbage for thinking that you’ve done a bad job, but in two days, we’re going to take out the trash in Washington, D.C.,” said Vance.

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Trump will hold four more rallies on Monday before Election Day. He’ll start in North Carolina, then head to Reading and Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania before ending the day in Michigan.

The Harris campaign will also be in Philadelphia on Monday for a massive Get Out the Vote concert on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway the night before Election Day 2024.

Kamala Harris’ campaign is hosting the concert, which is set to begin at 5 p.m. Monday.

The event is expected to have performances or remarks by DJ Cassidy, Fat Joe, Freeway and Just Blaze, Lady Gaga, DJ Jazzy Jeff, Ricky Martin, The Roots, Jazmine Sullivan and Adam Blackstone, and Oprah Winfrey.

Copyright © 2024 WPVI-TV. All Rights Reserved.

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When polls close in Pennsylvania, other battleground states on Election Day

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When polls close in Pennsylvania, other battleground states on Election Day


Arizona

Polls open at 8 a.m. in Arizona, which Joe Biden carried in 2020 by 0.3%. He was only the second Democratic presidential candidate to do so in nearly 70 years. Polls will close at 9 p.m.

Arizona does not release votes until all precincts have reported or one hour after all polls are closed, whichever is first.

In 2020, The Associated Press first reported Arizona results at 10:02 p.m. ET on Nov. 3, Election Day, and declared Biden the winner at 2:51 a.m. ET on Nov. 4.

Georgia

Polls open at 7 a.m. in Georgia, which played a key role in 2020. Biden was the first Democrat in a White House race to carry the state since Bill Clinton in 1992, defeating Trump by less than one-quarter of a percentage point, a margin of 11,779 votes.

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Since then, Trump’s efforts to overturn those results have been at the heart of a criminal case in Fulton County. It is on hold while his legal team pursues a pretrial appeal to have District Attorney Fani Willis removed from the case and the indictment tossed. The Georgia Court of Appeals will hear those arguments after the election.

Georgia’s polls close at 7 p.m.

In 2020, the AP first reported Georgia results at 7:20 p.m. ET on Nov. 3 and declared Biden the state’s winner at 7:58 p.m. ET on Nov. 19, more than two weeks after Election Day.

Michigan

Polls open at 7 a.m. ET in Michigan, one of the “blue wall” states that went narrowly for Trump in 2016 after almost 30 years of voting for Democratic candidates. Biden won it back four years later. His margin was about 154,000 votes out of more than 5.5 million votes.

Michigan covers two time zones, but polls in most of the state close at 8 p.m. ET, with the rest at 9 p.m. ET.

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In 2020, the AP first reported Michigan results at 8:08 p.m. ET on Nov. 3 and declared Biden the winner at 5:58 p.m. ET on Nov. 4.

Nevada

Polls open at 10 a.m. ET in Nevada, the smallest electoral vote prize of the battlegrounds. But it has one of the best track records as a presidential bellwether. The candidate who won Nevada has gone on to win the White House in 27 of the past 30 presidential elections.

Polls close at 10 p.m. ET. The state doesn’t release results until the last person in line has voted, so there’s usually been a wait between poll close and the first results.

In 2020, the AP first reported Nevada results at 11:41 p.m. ET on Nov. 3 and declared Biden the winner at 12:13 p.m. ET on Nov. 7.

North Carolina

Polls open at 6:30 a.m. ET in North Carolina, which has been carried by Democrats only two times in presidential elections since 1968. But the state has stayed competitive for both major parties. Trump’s 2020 victory in North Carolina, by about 1 percentage point, was his smallest winning margin in any state.

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Polls close at 7:30 p.m. ET.

In 2020, the AP first reported results at 7:42 p.m. ET on Nov. 3 and declared Trump the winner at 3:49 p.m. ET on Nov. 13.

Wisconsin

Polls open at 8 a.m. ET in Wisconsin, the third “blue wall” state in this group. Wisconsin is no stranger to close elections; the margin of victory in the state was less than 1 percentage point in 2020, 2016, 2004 and 2000.

Polls close at 9 p.m. ET.

In 2020, the AP first reported Wisconsin results at 9:07 p.m. ET on Nov. 3 and declared Biden the winner at 2:16 p.m. ET on Nov. 4.

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