Why Florida is the Final Battleground

If you only read one thing: One week from today we’ll know who our next president will be. Until then, both nominees are honing their closing messages and final arguments to voters as the race has shifted to just a few key states. With a multitude of paths to the White House, Hillary Clinton is focusing her efforts in the final days on closing the few available to Donald Trump—which requires wins in Florida, Ohio and North Carolina, and more. Florida has become the central battleground in the final stretch, with Team Clinton and Team Trump deploying the candidates, surrogates, and television ad dollars to the Sunshine State. Clinton is making final trips to most of the other battleground states this week in both a show of confidence and an effort to bank as many early votes as possible. Her trips are scrutinized, but her substantial ground operation makes her visits less important to the field program than Trump’s—only contributing to positive local news coverage. Trump’s travel schedule is less clear, but he has been more reliant on using his rallies to register voters and convince them to head to the polls, making his time comparatively more valuable.

With days to go, both candidates are painting increasingly dire pictures of the country should their rival win the White House. Trump has seized on the latest FBI investigative developments into Clinton’s email server to argue that she will be under a cloud of suspicion should she win, as Republicans gear up for four years of hearings. Clinton, meanwhile, has continued to hammer at Trump’s offensive comments to women, Latinos, and African-Americans, while warning of the possibility of a loose cannon having access to the nuclear football.

George P. Bush doubts his grandfather and uncle voted for Trump. Trump’s development math. And the roots of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton in photos.

Here are your must reads:

Must Reads

F.B.I.’s Email Disclosure Broke a Pattern Followed Even This Summer
Director under fire [New York Times]

Clinton, Trump Warn of Dire Consequences If Rival Wins
Nuclear war or a constitutional crisis [Associated Press]

Places Most Unsettled by Rapid Demographic Change Are Drawn to Donald Trump
Data show immigration has made small towns in the Midwest more racially diverse in the past 15 years, shifting the political needle [Wall Street Journal]

Trump Is Back on Script as the Race Tightens
Will that last? [Washington Post]

The Complicated History Behind California’s Vote on Bilingual Education
The question of whether immigrants to the U.S. should speak English is an old one [TIME]

Sound Off

“Well I’m here vouching for Mrs. Clinton and I think it’s high time somebody did and I’m doing it based on my personal experience with her and I think she deserves to have people vouch for her other than members of the Democratic National Committee so I’m here to do that.” — Libertarian VP Nominee Bill Weld to MSNBC

“She would be under protracted criminal investigation and probably a criminal trial, I would say. So we’d have a criminal trial of a sitting president.” — Trump on his rival on Monday

Bits and Bites

George P. Bush voted for Trump. His presidential uncle and grandpa? Maybe not, he says [Dallas Morning News]

Freedom Caucus plans secret meeting in D.C. today [Politico]

Video shows Trump with mob figure he denied knowing [Yahoo]

The Roots of Hillary Clinton [TIME]

The Roots of Donald Trump [TIME]

President Obama Makes Spirited Case for Hillary Clinton in Ohio [TIME]

FBI Releases 17-Year-Old Records From a Bill Clinton Presidential Pardon Investigation [TIME]

Mike Pence on New Polls: Republicans Are ‘Coming Home’ [TIME]

New Hillary Clinton Ad Highlights Donald Trump’s Remarks About Women [TIME]

Watch Hillary Clinton Get Grilled by Elementary School Students [People]

New York Times rejects ‘Hello, Dolly!’ ad that declared ‘It Takes a Woman’ [Politico]

Donald Trump’s Math Takes His Towers to Greater Heights [New York Times]