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Political Cornflakes: Trump readying to play a midterm blame game if GOP loses ground

President Donald Trump speaks at Elko Regional Airport, Saturday, Oct. 20, 2018, in Elko, Nv., during a campaign rally. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Trump readying to play a midterm blame game if GOP loses ground. More Utahns are registering to vote this year. Poll shows Utahns support Robert Mueller’s probe.

Happy Monday. Publicly, President Donald Trump says the midterm election is all about him -- “You’re voting for me," he said at a recent rally -- but privately, he’s already laying the groundwork to blame others for what is likely to be a tough election for Republicans. He’s telling confidants that he doesn’t see the midterms as a referendum on himself, describing his 2020 reelection bid as “the real election.” And he says that he holds House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell responsible for protecting their congressional majorities. [Politico]

Topping the news: Utah voter registrations are up significantly during this year’s midterm elections, and voter turnout is expected to be extremely high. The primary forces causing the hike is Proposition 2 legalizing medical marijuana, Mitt Romney’s Senate bid and President Trump. [Trib]

-> A majority of Utahns support special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, a new poll shows. [Trib]

-> Rep. Mia Love’s campaign accused a liberal group of rescinding a defamatory attack ad against Mia Love, but the group has disputed Love’s assertion. [Trib]

Tweets of the Day: From @jbouie:, “Be smart: politics is all a game for our entertainment.”

-> From @ConanOBrien, “For Halloween, I’m going as a newspaper.”

In other news: An environmental group has accused Utah Rep. Rob Bishop and the Natural Resources Committee of a “politically motivated abuse of authority”. [TribviaAP]

-> Utah voters aren’t sure whether to vote yes or no to Constitutional Amendment C that would allow the Legislature to call itself into session. [Trib][DNews]

-> Critics of the Inland Port currently in development near the Great Salt Lake have argued that it would significantly worsen Salt Lake City’s already poor air quality and damage the lake’s fragile ecosystem. [Trib]

-> Peer-to-peer car sharing app, Turo, launched in Utah recently with a shaky start, as one user renting out his car was confronted with misdemeanor charges after arranging a rental with a user to be picked up at the airport. Though this is standard for the app, Utah considers Turo to be a car rental company (despite Turo’s insistance that it’s just a platform). [Fox13]

-> A new Salt Lake Tribune-Hinckley Institute of Politics poll finds Rep. Chris Stewart with a comfortable 23 point lead over his Democratic opponent, Shireen Ghorbani, in the 2nd Congressional District race. [Trib]

-> A judge in the 3rd District Court affirmed a ruling on a multi-million dollar lawsuit against imprisoned FLDS leader Warren Jeffs. Jeffs is serving a prison sentence for sex crimes, and will now have to pay damages to an individual whom he sexually abused as a child. [Fox13]

-> Utah has been No. 1 for new job creation for months, but the US Bureau of Labor statistics released Friday that the state has dropped to No. 2, slightly behind Florida. [Trib]

-> There are two major constitutional amendments on the ballot this year which will address potential property tax exemptions and have associated impacts on voters. [DNews][Fox13]

-> Tribune columnist Robert Gehrke discussed “ruse checkpoints” –– signs falsely indicating that there are police ahead seeking to catch individuals with drugs in their vehicles. It has been ruled unconstitutional to have actual drug checkpoints as the people in question are generally not under the influence, so the “fake” checkpoints allow police to scare people into not carrying drugs through the area even though it isn’t actually enforced. [Trib]

-> Pat Bagley offers his take on Proposition 2 and its relation to the special legislative session scheduled to be discussed shortly after the midterm elections in November. [Trib]

-> Frank Pignanelli and LaVarr Webb dig into Proposition 4, a ballot initiative about political redistricting and gerrymandering. [DNews]

Nationally: President Donald Trump announced Saturday that the United States will be withdrawing from a nuclear disarmament treaty with Russia. Former Soviet leader, Mikhail S. Gorbachev, sharply critiqued Trump for the decision, stating that, “All agreements aimed at nuclear disarmament and limiting nuclear weapons must be preserved, for the sake of preserving life on earth.” Trump cited Russian and Chinese violations in his decision to withdraw from the treaty. [WSJ][NYTimes][BBC][CNN]

-> Trump shifted his tone towards Saudi Arabia on Sunday as members of Congress from both parties criticized the killing of an American journalist. Members of Congress and other journalism advocates want to see Saudi Arabia punished. [NYTimes][WaPost][BBC][WSJ]

-> The Trump administration is spearheading an effort to create a legal definition of sex under Title IX, which might squeeze out the term “transgender." The Department of Health and Human Services argued in its memo that there needs to be a biological basis for sexual identification, based on genitalia at birth. [NYTimes][CNN]

-> A large caravan of thousands of migrants headed to the U.S.-Mexico border from troubled Central American countries has sparked a familiar debate -- Immigration in the United States. [BBC][NYTimes]

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-- Thomas Burr and Cara MacDonald

https://twitter.com/thomaswburr and Twitter.com/carammacdonald