US Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton has retained her comfortable lead over Republican nominee Donald Trump in the aftermath of the first presidential debate, a new national poll shows. The Politico/Morning Consult poll released Monday showed the former secretary of state leading Trump by a 6-point margin in terms of national support, 42 percent to 36 percent.

Coming in at the third was Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson with 9 percent support, followed by Green Party candidate Jill Stein at 2 percent. Another 10 percent said they were undecided. In a head-to-head matchup, Clinton’s lead over the New York businessman was expanded to 7 points, 46 percent to 39 percent. The poll comes a week after the first presidential debate between the two candidates last Monday, which became the most-watched presidential face-off in the history of US elections.

Politico’s pre-debate version of the poll had found Trump at the top with a one-point lead, 39 percent to 38 percent. During the fiery debate, Clinton accused Trump of racism, sexism and tax avoidance, putting the real estate tycoon on the defensive for much of the 90-minute face-off at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York.

In the first Politico/Morning Consult poll after the debate, 49 percent of the respondents thought the former first lady had won. This time, nearly 44 percent of the participants said she was going to win the next debate, expected to be held on Sunday evening. Only 22 percent said the same about Trump.

According to the RealClearPolitics average of polls, as of Sunday, Clinton held a 2.5-point national edge, leading Trump 47.5 to 45 percent. Fox News’ latest survey also put Clinton in lead at 49 percent, with Trump trailing her at 44 percent. The only recent poll that put Trump on a stronger footing was conducted by LA Times/USC Tracking, according to which the New York businessman led Clinton 47 percent to 42 percent.

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Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders is set to campaign along with his former rival, Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, in the US state of New Hampshire in the run-up to 2016 presidential election.The Clinton campaign made the announcement on Sunday as the former US secretary of state was preparing for the first national debate before the November 8 Election Day with her rival, GOP nominee Donald Trump. Sanders will appear on the stage alongside Clinton at the University of New Hampshire Field House on Wednesday, two days after the first presidential debate, to talk about the issue of college affordability to American students.

“Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders will campaign together in New Hampshire to discuss their shared belief that cost should not be a barrier for anyone who chooses to go to college, and student debt should not hold Americans back after they leave school,” the Clinton campaign said in a statement. “That includes enabling all students with family income up to $125,000 to attend an in-state public college or university tuition-free, covering more than 80 percent of all families.”

On July 12, Clinton and Sanders joined forces at Portsmouth High School, where he endorsed her ahead of the Democratic National Convention. That was the last time the two politicians appeared together in public. Sanders had earlier managed to beat the former New York senator in the first-in-the-nation New Hampshire presidential primary by a landslide margin of 60 percent to 38 percent. As a presidential candidate, the Vermont senator vowed to “fight to make sure that every American who studies hard in school can go to college regardless of how much money their parents make and without going deeply into debt.”

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The campaign of US Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump is planning to spend $140 million on political advertising in the country’s major media to run until the November 8 Election Day. Trump’s communications director Jason Miller announced on Saturday that the hefty figure would include $100 million in television airtime and $40 million in online political ads, the Associated Press reported.

The plan represents a new approach for the billionaire businessman, who has repeatedly boasted in recent weeks about how much less he has spent than his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, and seemed to greatly rely on free media coverage of his large rallies. This is while the campaign of the wealthy Republican presidential hopeful ended August with just $50 million in cash on hand, according to official filings with the nation’s Federal Election Commission.

According to Kantar Media’s political advertising tally, the business mogul has only spent $22 million on TV and radio ads during the general election, while the campaign of Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton has so far spent $124 million on political advertisements. Miller said the new political ad purchases will be devoted to 13 battleground states, including Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Maine, New Mexico and Wisconsin.

The sum equates to nearly $16.7 million in TV ads per week, while Clinton’s campaign is intent on spending $11 million per week, with the option to purchasing more at any time. Trump, meanwhile, has continued to experience strong fundraising online in September, the report added citing campaign aides. Miller further stated that upcoming national television ads would focus on Trump’s key campaign themes, such as the economy and law and order.

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US Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump will win the race for the White House, says an American professor, who has correctly predicted all the last eight presidents of the United States.

Allan Lichtman, a distinguished professor of history at American University, told The Washington Post that based on a system he calls “Keys to the White House”, Trump will emerge victorious in the November election.

“Based on the 13 keys, it would predict a Donald Trump victory,” he claimed. The professor said he derived the system of true/false statements, “by looking at every American presidential election from 1860 to 1980, and have since used the system to correctly predict the outcomes of all eight American presidential elections from 1984 to 2012.” He said one of the keys he uses to predict the winner of the White House is that the candidate is charismatic or not.

Lichtman said Trump’s rival Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton “doesn’t fit the bill.” Another factor he mentioned against Clinton is that she is going to run after President Barack Obama—a Democrat– who had no major domestic or foreign policy achievements.

He also explained to the newspaper that his prediction is not based upon the polls, adding that “the polls have very recently tightened.” “Clinton is less ahead than she was before, but it’s not because Trump is rising, it’s because Clinton is falling,” he added.

According to the professor, the upcoming election was the most difficult to assess, because “We have never before seen a candidate like Donald Trump, and Donald Trump may well break patterns of history that have held since 1860.” With less than two months remaining to the election, Clinton holds a solid 6-point lead over Trump, according to the McClatchy-Marist poll released Friday.

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Former US Republican President George H.W. Bush has allegedly expressed his support for Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton in the November election, sources say. Sources close to the former president made the revelation on Tuesday, saying this was not the first time Bush had disclosed his intention to vote for Clinton.

“The President told me he’s voting for Hillary, that’s what he said,” Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, the niece of President John F. Kennedy, wrote in a Facebook post. The 92-year-old former president had already said in May that he would not endorse the party’s nominee Donald Trump.

The surprising move comes as the entire Bush family, including ex-president George W. Bush and Jeb Bush, a former Florida governor and ex-2016 presidential hopeful, skipped last month’s Republican National Convention, where Trump was officially nominated.

Jeb had also made it clear before the convention that he would not vote for Trump or Clinton in November. “I will not vote for Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton, but I will support principled conservatives at the state and federal levels, just as I have done my entire life,” he wrote on his Facebook page in May.

Trump said during a Tampa, Florida, campaign event in June that he was waiting for his endorsement. “I don’t think he’s going to endorse me, do you folks?” Trump asked his supporters before dismissively adding, “Who the hell cares?” Jeb Bush predicted in July that the real estate mogul’s supporters will feel “betrayed” when his campaign promises fail to materialize. “There isn’t going to be a wall built,” Bush told MSNBC in an interview. “And Mexico’s not going to pay for it. And there’s not going to be a ban on Muslims.”

The New York businessman’s campaign has been marred by his disparaging remarks against minorities in the US. His comments include a call to ban all Muslims from coming to America as well as forced deportation of Mexican migrants by building a long wall along the US-Mexico border.

Trump has also sought for a database to track Muslims across the United States and said that the US would have “absolutely no choice” but to close down mosques. Trump’s proposal has been condemned by Muslim and human rights groups as well as his Democratic rival and many of his Republican proponents who describe the proposal as divisive, counterproductive and contrary to American values.

Over the past few days, nearly all polls have indicated a tightening race between Clinton and Trump at national and state levels as nearly 50 days are left to the presidential vote.

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US Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has opened up a narrow lead over his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, a new poll shows, signaling the end of the former secretary of state’s months-long dominance in terms national support

The survey, released by right-leaning Red Oak Strategic on Monday, revealed that the New York businessman had managed to close the gap with Clinton and lead her by 2 points, 35 percent to 33 percent.

Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson was third with 8 percent support while Green Party nominee Jill Stein was not featured in the poll. Around 24 percent of the participants said they either had another candidate in mind or were yet to select any.

In the poll’s previous version from early September, Trump was behind the former first lady 31 percent to 34 percent. Clinton did not stand a chance in a head-to-head matchup either, according to the poll, as Trump was leading her 51 percent to 48 percent. Clinton held a similar lead in the poll’s previous iteration.

Interestingly, about 41 percent of the participants said they had voted for President Barack Obama in the 2012 election, while only 34 percent opted for the Republican ticket Mitt Romney.

This was the first time that Trump was leading Clinton in a Red Oak Strategic survey, since the company began tracking the race in August. Over the past few days, nearly all polls have indicated a tightening race between Clinton and Trump at national and state levels.  This is while we are nearly 50 days from the vote.

According to the latest CBS News Battleground Tracker poll issued Sunday, for example, the pair was tied at 42 percent in 13 battleground states. Clinton’s lead shrunk to less than one point in the latest RealClearPolitics average of national polls.

The Democratic nominee’s recent health issues are likely to have affected her polling performance. Unanswered questions about the true nature of the Clinton Foundation along with Clinton’s email fiasco are some of the other issues that might have led to the decline in support.

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US President Barack Obama has called on the African-American community to rally around Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton in an effort to defeat Republican candidate Donald Trump in the November election.

Obama, America’s first black president, made the call in an emotional speech at the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation gala on Saturday night in Washington. Clinton also attended event. “If I hear anybody saying their vote does not matter, that it doesn’t matter who we elect — read up on your history. It matters. We’ve got to get people to vote,” Obama said.

“We have achieved historic turnout in 2008 and 2012, especially in the African-American community. I will consider it a personal insult and an insult to my legacy if this community lets down its guard and fails to activate itself in this election,” he said. “You want to give me a good send-off? Go vote.”

According to exit polls, record numbers of black voters casted their ballots in 2012, and 93 percent of them backed Obama over Republican candidate Mitt Romney. A recent survey conducted by the Washington Post showed Clinton having an 80-point lead over Trump among black voters.

“If you care about our legacy, realize everything we stand for is at stake. All the progress we’ve made is at stake in this election,” he said. “My name may not be on the ballot, but our progress is on the ballot. Tolerance is on the ballot. Democracy is on the ballot. Justice is on the ballot. Good schools are on the ballot. Ending mass incarceration, that’s on the ballot right now,” he said.

Last month, Trump asked African-American voters to vote for him since they “have nothing to lose.” Trump talked about disproportionate levels of poverty, unemployment and failing schools for the black community in the United States and claimed he would make a better future for them if he won the White House.

“You’re living in poverty, your schools are no good, you have no jobs, 58% of your youth is unemployed — what the hell do you have to lose?” Trump asked the audience.

In his speech on Saturday night, Obama said Trump says “we got nothing left to lose, so we might as well support somebody who has fought against civil rights, and fought against equality, and who has shown no regard for working people for most of his life. Well, we do have challenges, but we’re not stupid.”

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