0:03

The death toll from Hurricane Helene

0:05

continues to rise, while hundreds of

0:07

thousands remain stranded with no water

0:09

or power. FEMA is not

0:11

on the ground there at all. They

0:13

are not in these cities, not in

0:15

these towns, and not in these villages.

0:18

I'm Georgia Howe with Daily Wire

0:20

Editor-in-Chief John Bickley. It's

0:23

Thursday, October 3rd, and this is

0:25

Morning Wire. The

0:31

fallout from the first and only

0:33

VP debate continues, with most media

0:35

outlets agreeing on the winner. J.D.

0:38

Vance is much more experienced at

0:40

this, at public speaking, at defending

0:42

himself, at pivoting. And

0:44

several states have cleaned up their voter

0:46

rolls ahead of November, while others are

0:49

fighting election integrity efforts. There

0:51

are many states that are doing absolutely nothing

0:53

to take people who become ineligible off the

0:55

voter rolls. Thanks for waking

0:57

up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned, we have the

1:00

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Lumen. That's

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LUMEN.M-E slash wire for 15% off

1:34

your purchase. In

1:39

the wake of Hurricane Helene, rescue

1:41

and relief efforts across the southeast

1:43

continue, as millions of people remain

1:45

in need of basic resources like

1:48

food, water, and gasoline. Meanwhile,

1:50

local officials and some residents are

1:52

criticizing the slow government response. Here

1:55

to discuss this, Daily Wire reporter Amanda

1:57

Presta-Jakimohi. Amanda, so first, what's the... the

2:00

latest information we have about these

2:02

affected areas. Well, unfortunately, John,

2:04

more than 180 people have

2:06

been confirmed dead and that number is

2:08

expected to rise. Search and rescue

2:11

operations for hundreds of missing people are currently

2:13

being conducted and the American Red Cross said

2:15

they received more than 3000 calls in just

2:17

24 hours from

2:20

people searching for their loved ones. As

2:22

we've reported here, North Carolina was

2:24

hit particularly hard. Large portions of

2:26

Asheville, Chimney Rock, Swannanoa and Biltmore

2:28

Village were wiped out by flooding

2:30

and at least 90 people

2:33

in the state have been confirmed dead. The

2:35

Western part of North Carolina is

2:37

struggling with limited power, internet and

2:39

cell service and water systems

2:41

have been destroyed. Now on

2:43

this issue of internet access, there has

2:45

been some progress on this thanks largely

2:47

to Elon Musk. Dozens of

2:50

his satellite systems called Starlink, they've

2:52

already been made available in North

2:54

Carolina and Musk also announced late

2:56

Tuesday that he's making Starlink free

2:58

for those in affected communities. According

3:01

to Musk, Trump worked with him to get

3:03

Starlink to those in need. The former president

3:05

also set up a fundraiser online for hurricane

3:08

victims. That's already brought in over $4 million.

3:11

What about the federal response? What's going on

3:13

there? Well, President Joe Biden,

3:15

ahead of his visit to the Carolinas on

3:17

Wednesday, he ordered the deployment of 1000

3:19

active duty troops to

3:22

aid with recovery efforts. He

3:24

said this is going to speed up

3:26

the delivery of food, water and medicine

3:28

to isolated communities. 1000

3:30

FEMA workers have been deployed to help with their

3:32

response as well as thousands of other federal workers.

3:35

And the agency says they've shipped out millions

3:37

of meals and liters of water, 150 generators

3:39

and 200,000 tarps. Some

3:43

North Carolina residents and local officials

3:45

though, they've harshly criticized the federal

3:47

and state government for the limited

3:49

and slow response. Keep in

3:51

mind, North Carolina was already in a state of

3:54

emergency back on September 26th. Here's

3:56

one resident from Asheville talking to NBC. Nobody's

3:59

got a job. to help us. Do you have any faith

4:02

in the federal response here? No, no.

4:05

Another resident said that in the absence of

4:07

federal aid, private citizens are stepping up to

4:09

help one another. What

4:11

there is, is lines of

4:14

private planes that have landed

4:16

and are taking off that

4:18

have dropped off supplies and

4:20

personnel. See, America is responding.

4:22

Joe, Kamala, do you know

4:24

you have a military? Why can't

4:27

you use those same resources that we've

4:29

already paid for here now? North

4:32

Carolina Representative Chuck Edwards criticized the slow

4:34

response from FEMA, saying it looked like

4:37

they had taken the weekend off. Edwards

4:39

said counties in his area were in desperate

4:42

need of water and at one point 400

4:45

pallets of food and water dropped off by

4:47

FEMA were not able to be located by

4:49

state officials. So a lot of chaos there.

4:52

Yeah. Biden, as we mentioned earlier,

4:54

he finally visited the Carolinas on Wednesday. He

4:57

also took some heat for being away in

4:59

Delaware over the weekend when people were really

5:01

struggling in the southeast. Here's his response

5:03

when a reporter asked him about that. Come on,

5:06

stop. Okay, when you're in the wild and

5:08

Delaware, it's 90 miles from here, okay? I

5:10

was on the phone the whole time. Biden

5:13

is also scheduled to visit Florida and

5:15

Georgia today. And as for Harris, the

5:18

Democrat nominee, she surveyed damage in Georgia

5:20

on Wednesday, two days after Trump's visit.

5:23

She vowed that the administration would be there

5:25

for the long haul. So many people still

5:27

desperate for help there and a lot of

5:29

Americans pitching in. Amanda, thank you so much

5:31

for reporting. Yeah, you're welcome. As

5:36

the dust settles following Tuesday's consequential

5:38

VP debate, both campaigns are hoping

5:40

for an edge, highlighting the best

5:42

of their candidates' performances. Here

5:45

with Moore's Daily Wire senior editor, Cabot,

5:47

Philip C. Cabot. So what sort of

5:49

impact did Tuesday's showdown have on this

5:52

race so far? Well, first, Americans were

5:54

clearly interested, according to preliminary estimates from

5:56

Ad Impact, a staggering 67 million

5:59

people. tuned in. That is just a

6:01

hair below the number who watched Harrison

6:03

Trump last month. And there's no question

6:05

that the instant reaction from the legacy

6:07

media was that J.D. Vance was the

6:09

clear winner. The influential political playbook said

6:11

their entire editorial team named him the

6:14

winner while the New York Times even

6:16

read a piece titled Vance's dominant debate

6:18

performance shows why he's Trump's running mate.

6:20

We heard similar messages from many

6:22

left-leaning media figures as well. For

6:24

example, here's CNN's John King. The

6:27

two issues driving the campaign right now are

6:29

Harris has a big deficit on the economy.

6:31

Harris has a big deficit on immigration and

6:33

Republicans were happy tonight and Democrats a little

6:36

bit nervous that on those two issues, Vance

6:38

carried it. Now coming into

6:40

this debate, Harris officials had been saying off

6:43

the record that they were worried about how

6:45

walls would do noting that he, like his

6:47

running mate, has really not done any combative

6:49

interviews on the national stage. Something Vance has

6:52

done weekly for months. But

6:54

afterwards they expressed confidence in his

6:56

performance saying he may have started

6:58

slowly but finished strong. So

7:00

the media seemingly crowning Vance the

7:03

winner. What about voters? Yeah,

7:05

according to the few polls we've seen, they

7:07

felt the debate was much closer. When asked

7:10

to one, CBS polling had Vance with

7:12

a one point advantage while CNN had him

7:14

with a two point advantage. So very close.

7:16

But if you dig into the numbers, there

7:18

are some encouraging results for the Trump

7:20

campaign. For example, Politico found that among those

7:23

who did not tune in, only 34 percent

7:26

of voters said Vance was ready to be

7:28

president. But for those who did watch, those

7:30

numbers jumped to 51 percent. Now

7:32

as we touched on yesterday, the rules

7:34

said fact checking would be left to

7:37

the candidates, not the moderators, but they

7:39

did fact check Vance several times. Tell

7:41

us about the fallout from that. Yeah,

7:43

they interjected repeatedly and only really targeted

7:45

Vance. The Trump campaign has since highlighted

7:48

a number of false claims made by

7:50

walls asking why the moderators

7:52

did not jump in. For example, he repeated

7:54

that claim that a Georgia woman named Amber

7:56

Thurman died because of pro-life laws when she

7:59

actually died of sepsis after being given

8:01

an abortion pill. He claimed drug cartels

8:03

were not using children as drug mules

8:05

at the southern border, something that's been

8:07

long confirmed. And he claimed the flood

8:09

of illegal immigrants has not driven up

8:11

the cost of housing, despite data from

8:13

the Federal Reserve showing otherwise. And

8:15

perhaps most notably, walls vehemently denied that his

8:18

state allowed for babies who survive abortions to

8:20

be left to die outside the womb. But

8:22

according to medical records, there have been at

8:24

least eight such cases under his tenure in

8:27

Minnesota state with again, no

8:29

restrictions on abortion up until birth. Right.

8:31

Now, before we let you go, one

8:33

other campaign related story, there's a new

8:35

report about Doug Imhoff that's made the

8:37

rounds. Tell us about that. Yeah, a

8:39

disturbing story. So on Wednesday, the Daily

8:41

Mail reported that back in 2012, Doug

8:44

Imhoff, the husband of Kamala Harris allegedly

8:47

struck his ex-girlfriend after she flirted with

8:49

another man, hitting her so hard she

8:51

spun around while standing in a valet

8:53

in 2009. The report includes three unnamed

8:55

friends of the woman who confirmed the

8:57

account with pictures and communications from the

8:59

time of the incident. One of those

9:01

women said the ex-girlfriend had called her

9:03

sobbing immediately afterwards. Now remember,

9:05

Imhoff was already at the heart of another

9:07

scandal this year. In that case, he admitted

9:09

to a past affair in which he'd impregnated

9:11

a teacher at his child's school, ending

9:14

his first marriage back in 2009. That's

9:16

a more questions to answer for

9:18

the Harris campaign. Capit, thanks for

9:20

reporting. Anytime. Several

9:24

states have cleaned up voter rolls

9:27

in advance of the presidential election,

9:29

but some states, including the battleground

9:31

state of Nevada, still send mail-in

9:33

ballots to every registered voter, regardless

9:35

of eligibility. Joining

9:38

us to discuss concerns around election

9:40

integrity is Hans von Spikovsky, manager

9:42

of the Election Law Reform Initiative

9:44

at the Heritage Foundation. Hans,

9:46

thanks so much for coming on. Sure. First

9:49

off, what percent of ballots are expected to be mailed

9:51

in this year? That

10:00

was a 20 percentage point increase for 2016. So

10:04

a very large number. And this year,

10:06

I expect it's probably going to be

10:08

about the same number, if not larger.

10:11

Now, a lot of conservatives had concerns

10:13

about that and the integrity of mail-in

10:15

ballots in general. Have there

10:17

been successful efforts by states to strengthen

10:19

security around the election with regards to

10:22

mail-in ballots? It has

10:24

in some states, Georgia and

10:26

Texas, for example. Both

10:28

of those states extended their

10:31

voter ID requirement to absentee

10:33

ballots. Does that stop

10:35

all of the potential fraud with absentee

10:38

ballots? No, but it makes it more

10:40

difficult to commit if you

10:42

also have to show a government-issued

10:44

ID, for example, when you request

10:46

an absentee ballot. But other states

10:49

haven't done anything like that.

10:51

Nevada now mails ballots to

10:53

every single registered voter, despite

10:56

the fact that their

10:58

voter rolls have been shown to be

11:00

extremely bad, inaccurate. And they don't have

11:02

any kind of ID requirement at all.

11:05

Now, what about other security measures like

11:07

poll watching? Have local GOP chapters made

11:09

efforts to bolster their numbers in that

11:12

capacity or just be more involved in

11:14

the in-person election process as well? They've

11:17

been trying to do both. Transparency is vital if

11:19

you want to have a fair and honest election.

11:21

And of course, one of the problems with mail-in

11:23

ballots is they're voted outside

11:25

the supervision of election officials and outside

11:28

the observation of poll watchers. We are

11:30

generally better off in 2024 than we

11:32

were in 2020. But

11:35

look, it all depends on

11:38

what state you're in. I'd

11:40

say about half of the

11:42

states passed reforms that improved

11:44

the election process. Georgia did

11:46

Tennessee, Florida, Ohio. Unfortunately,

11:49

other states did nothing or

11:51

have made things worse. Michigan is an

11:54

example of that. Michigan actually used to

11:56

have a good voter ID law and

11:58

they gutted that law. So a

12:00

lot of it just depends on what state

12:03

you're in. Overall, we're better off, but

12:05

there are still problems in various states

12:07

across the country. Now, I want

12:09

to bring up the recent voter roll cleanups. In

12:12

North Carolina, they removed about 750,000 ineligible voters. That's

12:16

about a 10th of their overall voters. Georgia

12:18

removed about 100,000 voters, mostly

12:21

due to death and duplicate entries. Are

12:24

these isolated problems or do other states have a

12:26

serious voter roll cleanup to do as well? See,

12:29

again, it depends on what state

12:32

you're in. Nevada is a good

12:34

example. California is another example. North

12:36

Carolina finally is doing

12:39

what it should have been doing

12:41

all along, which is taking people

12:43

off the rolls who have died

12:46

or moved away or otherwise become

12:48

ineligible, perhaps because of a felony

12:50

conviction. That may sound like

12:52

a lot, about 10%, about 10% of Americans

12:55

move every

12:58

year. So taking 10% of

13:00

people who are ineligible off the voter

13:03

rolls, that's not that out of the

13:05

ordinary at all. Now, a

13:07

recent audit by the Arizona Secretary of State found

13:09

that 218,000 voters in Arizona may

13:14

be missing citizenship documentation. Is

13:17

that a significant issue across a lot of states? It

13:20

is because Arizona is actually one

13:22

of the only states that's been

13:24

trying to do something about that,

13:26

which is to enforce a law

13:28

that requires proof of citizenship when

13:30

you actually register to vote. Now,

13:32

other states have been trying to

13:34

find non-citizens. You may have seen

13:36

that just recently, Texas announced it

13:38

had found 6,500 aliens on

13:41

the voter rolls they removed, Virginia, 6,300, Alabama,

13:44

over 3,000. But

13:47

that's simply from checking DMV records and

13:49

finding folks who, when they went in

13:51

to get a driver's license, said, well,

13:54

I'm not a US citizen. That doesn't

13:56

help with the vast majority of people

13:58

who are registering, perhaps. who haven't done

14:00

it through DMV. And the only way

14:02

to fix that is for other states

14:04

to start requiring proof of citizenship. Of

14:06

course, every time states do that, they

14:09

get sued by the political left to

14:11

try to prevent them from being able

14:13

to do that. All right, well,

14:15

Hans, thank you so much for coming on. Sure. Another

14:20

story we're tracking this week, special counsel

14:22

Jack Smith's 165-page immunity motion was

14:26

released by Judge Tanya Chutkin on

14:28

Wednesday. The motion claims Donald Trump

14:31

acted as a private citizen, not

14:33

as president, when trying to overturn

14:35

the 2020 election. The

14:37

motion comes in response to the recent

14:40

Supreme Court decision granting immunity to presidents

14:42

for official duties. Thanks

14:44

for waking up with us. We'll be back later this

14:46

afternoon with more news you need to know.