US Election Latest: Trump meets Starmer, machinations in the Senate and more swing states

• Catch up with all the key US politics news in our daily column

• Donald Trump meets Keir Starmer in New York

• Senators are jockeying to succeed Mitch McConnell as Senate leader

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When Keir met The Donald

As the annual United Nations confab has been underway this week, Keir Starmer made his maiden speech to the UN General Assembly.

He also took the opportunity to have a long-awaited meeting with former President Donald Trump. Vice President Harris was unable to meet Starmer, citing diary clashes.

As Labour leader, Starmer has always maintained a pragmatic approach to Trump - never directly criticising the former President and insisting as Prime Minister he would work with whoever was the President of the United States at the time.

Yet this charm offensive came despite the awkward fact of the Labour Cabinet's history of pointed attacks on Trump. This includes the UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy, who once called Trump a "woman-hating, neo-Nazi sympathizing sociopath".

Starmer and Trump had a two-hour dinner together at Trump Tower last night. In a press conference ahead of the meeting, Trump praised Starmer as "very nice", and having "ran a great race, he did very well". Yet in the same press conference, he lavished praise on his long-standing friend Nigel Farage, too.

While Starmer's recent polling has left something to be desired, punters clearly think he's around for the long run, with the most popular odds for him being replaced as Labour Leader being "2029 or later" on the Betfair Exchange, at 5/71.71.

Trump remains locked in a tight race with Harris, though his odds shortened in the last few days to reach 11/102.11.

Out with Mitch McConnell

The Leader of the Senate Republicans is a true creature of Washington, D.C.

Mitch McConnell has been a Senator from Kentucky since 1985, and since 2007 he has been the leader of the Republicans in the Senate, including as Majority Leader from 2015 to 2021 - the period when the Republicans held the Senate majority.

This makes him the longest-serving Senate party leader in US history, almost equalling the House of Representatives' Nancy Pelosi who spent 20 years leading House Democrats until last year.

He previously announced he would step down in January 2025, creating a once-in-a-generation opportunity for an ambitious Senate Republican to take the mantle.

With Senate control anticipated to swing to the Republicans after the 2024 election - they are currently 1/31.33 to win it on 5 November - this will be a position of huge authority over the legislative agenda in the US.

The race is heating up, and behind closed doors the two frontrunners are making pitches to their colleagues - Senator John Thune the long-standing Senator from South Dakota, and John Cornyn, an equally long-standing Senator from Texas.

Both come from traditionally Republican states - Trump carried South Dakota by 62% to Biden's 36% in 2020. Yet Texas is increasingly becoming competitive as its demographics shift in big cities such as Dallas, Austin, and Houston.

On the Betfair Exchange, the Republicans are 1/1001.01 to carry South Dakota and 1/141.07 to win Texas in the Presidential election.

Both Thune and Cornyn will be trying to win over their colleagues in this critical election period with promises of support - both in terms of financial firepower for at-risk colleagues in elections, and support for legislative proposals when elected.

Emerging stories from a tight election

As has become an almost daily occurrence, reports today show some of the new ways in which both the Harris and Trump campaigns are carefully courting swing states and critical voter blocs.

Trump has been the latest candidate to meet a group of Latter-day Saints at his home in Mar-a-Lago, with an eye towards the key swing states of Arizona and Nevada.

More than 440,000 Latter-day Saints live in Arizona, and 180,000 in Nevada. Biden won both states in 2020 by low 5-digit margins.

To add to her recent economic policy speech, Harris also did her first solo sitdown interview with MSNBC since the debate, where she expanded on her economic message.

Swing state voters in particular are seeking to find out more about her policy platform, something the Harris campaign has been keen to ensure this week. No doubt this will be a growing trend for the campaign in coming weeks.

And finally, more polling.

A pair of new polls by UMass Lovell and YouGov spotlight two key swing states that still look tight between Harris and Trump.

In Michigan, Harris leads Trump with 48% to his 43%, just outside of the margin of error. Yet in Pennsylvania, while she is also at 48%, Trump is close behind and well within the margin of error at 46%.

This year's British election became notable for the highest number of polls ever. Expect this year's US election to be no different, with more data coming out almost daily from now until the election.

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