Barrett on Capitol Hill for final questions; Supreme Court halts census; Trump, Biden in swing states

These headlines are in the news this morning: Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett will appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee for the final day of questioning; the Supreme Court sided with the Trump administration to end the census early; and President Trump and Joe Biden are crisscrossing the swing states with three weeks to go before Election Day.

Read on for these stories, other top headlines, celebrity birthdays and more.

Top stories

Barrett back on Capitol Hill for senators' final questions

Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett returns to Capitol Hill for a third day of confirmation hearings as senators dig deeper into the conservative judge's outlook on abortion, health care and a potentially disputed presidential election — the Democrats running out of time to stop Republicans pushing her quick confirmation.

Wednesday's session is set to be Barrett's last before the Senate Judiciary Committee. She has been batting away questions in long and lively exchanges, insisting she would bring no personal agenda to the court but decide cases “as they come.”

Her nomination by President Donald Trump to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has ground other legislative business to a halt as Republicans excited by the prospect of locking in a 6-3 conservative court majority race to confirm her over Democratic objections before Election Day.

The 48-year-old appellate court judge declared her conservative views in often colloquial language, but she refused many specifics Tuesday. She aligns with the late Justice Antonin Scalia, a conservative mentor, and declined to say whether she would recuse herself from any election-related cases involving Trump and Democratic nominee Joe Biden.

***

Supreme Court halts census in latest twist of 2020 count

The Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled that the Trump administration can end census field operations early, in a blow to efforts to make sure minorities and hard-to-enumerate communities are properly counted in the crucial once-a-decade tally.

The decision was not a total loss for plaintiffs in a lawsuit challenging the administration’s decision to end the count early. They managed to get nearly two extra weeks of counting people as the case made its way through the courts.

However, the ruling increased the chances of the Trump administration retaining control of the process that decides how many congressional seats each state gets — and by extension how much voting power each state has.

***

Fighting in swing states, Trump also forced to play defense

President Donald Trump is being forced to play Electoral College defense with a trip to Iowa, a state he won handily in 2016 but where Democrat Joe Biden is making a late push.

Trump's heavy travel this week, including his rally Wednesday in Des Moines, reflects his uphill climb three weeks before the election. He has already visited Pennsylvania and Florida and will head to another battleground state he likely can’t win without — North Carolina — as well as those he once thought were in his grasp but where recent polling shows Biden improving — Iowa and Georgia.

Both candidates tailored their campaigning Tuesday to best motivate voters who could cast potentially decisive ballots.

Biden went to Florida to court older voters, looking to deliver a knockout blow in a state Trump needs to win while trying to woo a group whose support for the president has slipped. And Trump visited Pennsylvania, arguably the most important state on the electoral map, unleashing fierce attacks on Biden’s fitness for office in his opponent’s backyard.

In other news today ...

• A trio of space travelers has launched successfully to the International Space Station, for the first time using a fast-track maneuver to reach the orbiting outpost in just three hours.
• Members of anti-government paramilitary groups implicated in an alleged plot to kidnap Michigan’s governor ahead of the November election because of her measures to slow the coronavirus also discussed abducting Virginia’s governor, an FBI agent testified Tuesday.
• Dry, windy weather is posing an extreme wildfire risk in Northern California, where massive blazes already have cost hundreds of homes and killed or injured dozens of people.
• Prosecutors in the case against four former Minneapolis officers charged in the death of George Floyd are asking a Minnesota judge to restrict public access to new court filings for two days so the opposing side has a chance to ask for that information to be sealed.
• Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said he's scheduling a procedural vote on a GOP COVID-19 relief bill next week, pushing aid to hard-hit businesses in a smaller-bore approach to virus relief that Democrats say they won't go for.
• Walmart is spreading out its traditional one-day Black Friday deals over three weekends in November in an effort to reduce crowds in its stores during a pandemic. The nation's largest retailer said that more of its doorbuster deals will be reserved for online, as a way to steer more shoppers away from its stores.
• Germany has agreed to provide more than a half billion euros to aid Holocaust survivors struggling under the burdens of the coronavirus pandemic, the organization that negotiates compensation with the German government said Wednesday.
• China, Russia and Cuba won seats on the U.N.’s premiere human rights body Tuesday despite opposition from activist groups over their abysmal human rights records, but another target, Saudi Arabia, lost.
• A leading international economic watchdog has urged the British government to conclude a free trade agreement with the European Union in the coming days and weeks to support the recovery from the coronavirus pandemic.
• Conchata Ferrell, who became known for her role as Berta the housekeeper on TV’s “Two and a Half Men” after a long career as a character actor on stage and in movies, including “Mystic Pizza” and ”Network," has died. She was 77.

Click on the links below for full versions of these stories and scroll further for trending stories, a look at today in history and celebrity birthdays.

Today's national forecast

From California to Texas, record heat, strong winds and extreme drought cause wildfire worries for millions. CNN Meteorologist Karen Maginnis has the details.

Trending today

Image of the day

On this date

Happy birthday to ...