Ilia Garcia of Univision 65 then asked Casey what he would do to get a comprehensive immigration bill passed.

Casey said he would start by passing the “bipartisan border security bill” currently before the Senate, which would give the president greater authority to close the border and reduce the flow of fentanyl to the country. He said that the bill didn’t pass because Donald Trump pushed Republicans in Congress to reject it.

McCormick, however, called it a “liberal” bill that effectively offered “amnesty.”

Garcia then turned to McCormick and asked what he would do to protect immigrant families given the rise in anti-immigrant sentiments “with President Trump demonizing migrants.’

McCormick noted his wife is an immigrant, “so I’m pro-immigrant.” However, he did not indicate how he would reduce anti-immigrant sentiments and returned to border security, accusing the Biden-Harris administration of not doing enough.

“It’s been a disaster,” he said. “Ten million illegal immigrants met people on the terrorist watch list.” Later, he added that Democrats “are trying to change the conversation because they have failed to secure a border in terms of hate crimes.”

The conversation then turned to partisanship in Washington and how the candidates would work with the other side and, hypothetically, with each other. However, both appeared to believe that there was little common ground to start from.

McCormick said that, as a former platoon leader and CEO, he “would get things done,” unlike Casey, who “doesn’t have a record to stand on.”

“If you want to talk about civility, we got to get through this election, get a new senator in Pennsylvania that can actually work across the aisle and get things done,” he said. “Senator Casey has not proven himself to be such a senator.”

Casey retorted that his record demonstrates that he has worked across the aisle.

“I wrote and passed more bills than almost anybody in the whole Senate,” he said. “Because of my legislation, because of my work, we invested in infrastructure in Pennsylvania like we’ve never done before.”

Turning to the war in Gaza, Williams referred to the $18 billion the U.S. has given to Israel since the October 7 attack last year and asked, “How do you believe the US can continue to support Israel’s right to self-defense while also addressing the humanitarian needs of Palestinian civilians and other civilians as this conflict spreads?

In response, both candidates competed for who was a bigger supporter of Israel.

“We’ve got to continue to support Israel’s efforts, not just to defend itself, but to take the fight to those terrorists that are threatening them every single day,” Casey responded. “And I’ll continue to support Israel as I always have.”

When Williams repeated the question, Casey added, “I should have added that we have to continue to support robust support for food for people in Gaza, medicine and medical supplies.”

McCormick again blamed the White House.

“What’s happening in the Middle East comes from weakness, and we are being tested from our adversaries around the world,” McCormick said. “President Biden should support Israel completely. Israel is in the fight for its life. It’s being attacked by Hezbollah.”

The candidates highly differed when it came to whether they would ban guns such as AK-47s and AR-15s, which have been used in some high-profile mass shootings.

McCormick argued they are protected by the Second Amendment.

“Those are semi-automatic rifles,” he said. “I’m in favor of those not being restricted. They’re used for sporting; they’re used for protection.”

Casey said that he favors such restrictions.

“These common-sense measures will have no impact on Second Amendment rights,” he said. “It’ll have no impact on law-abiding gun owners who need a gun for self-protection or want a gun to hunt.”

Former President Donald Trump is expected to work the fry cooker at a McDonald’s in Pennsylvania this weekend after raising doubts about Vice President Kamala Harris’ past employment at the fast food restaurant, according to a report.

A source familiar with the matter told the Philadelphia Inquirer on Tuesday the GOP presidential nominee will serve up some fast food at the Golden Arches during a campaign stop in the crucial swing state on Sunday.

Trump, for weeks, has questioned whether Harris actually worked at McDonald’s as the Democratic presidential nominee has claimed.

“We don’t want to hear fake promises, even something like she worked very long and hard hours over french fries at McDonalds,” he said in late September in North Carolina. “She never worked at McDonald’s. It’s a fake story.”

Trump, who is a fan of McDonald’s grub, also indicated he would stop by a McDonald’s in mid-October and add cook to his resume.

“I think I’m going to a McDonald’s in two weeks actually and I’m gonna work the french fries because I will have worked longer and harder at McDonald’s than she did if I do that even for a half-hour,” Trump, 78, said to cheers.

Harris, 59, has said repeatedly over the years that she worked for Mickey D’s while getting her undergraduate degree in the 1980s, including in a campaign ad released in August and in an interview with MSNBC in September.

But there is no firm evidence, like an employment record or photo, to verify that claim, fact checker Snopes has said.

SCOTUS NEWS

The Supreme Court on Tuesday sent a challenge to a Pennsylvania law barring people 18- to 20-years-old from carrying guns back to the lower courts for another look in light of last term’s decision in United States v. Rahimi, in which the justices attempted to provide guidance for courts reviewing Second Amendment challenges to restrictions on gun rights. The announcement came on a list of orders from the justices’ private conference last week.

The justices did not add any new cases to their docket for the 2024-25 term.

In Paris v. Lara, Pennsylvania had appealed in a challenge to a state law that effectively bars 18- to 20-year-olds from openly carrying a gun when Pennsylvania has declared a state of emergency. In a decision issued in June 2023, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit barred the state from enforcing the law, reasoning that the words “the people” in the Second Amendment “presumptively encompass all Americans, including 18-to-20-year-olds, and we are aware of no founding-era law that supports disarming people in that age group.”

Pennsylvania’s attorney general, Michelle Henry, told the justices that the Supreme Court’s June 2024 decision in Rahimi had “abrogated the Third Circuit’s analysis.” In Rahimi, the court upheld a federal law that bans anyone who is the subject of a domestic-violence restraining order from possessing a gun. In reaching that holding, Henry noted, Chief Justice John Roberts explained that even if the modern regulation being challenged “does not precisely match” laws restricting gun rights in early English or U.S. history, “it may still be analogous enough to pass constitutional muster.” Henry urged the justices to send the case back so that the 3rd Circuit could reconsider it in the wake of the court’s decision in Rahimi, and on Tuesday the justices did just that.

The justices on Tuesday also turned down a petition asking them to decide whether an indigent defendant who is represented by a public defender has the same constitutional right to continued representation by his initial court-appointed lawyer as a defendant who has retained his own lawyer.

The justices did not act on several petitions for review from the long list of petitions that accumulated over the summer, which they first met to discuss on Sept. 30. These petitions involve topics ranging from where challenges to the Environmental Protection Agency’s actions under the Clean Air Act should be filed to a challenge to the admissions program at three of Boston’s elite public high schools.

The justices will meet again for another private conference on Friday, Oct. 18.

This article was originally published at Howe on the Court.