FBI probes Trump hack, Harris team says it was also targeted | The Excerpt

On Tuesday’s episode of The Excerpt podcast: The FBI is investigating allegations that Iranian cyber agents breached Donald Trump’s presidential campaign . USA TODAY Trump Campaign Reporter Zac Anderson breaks down new USA TODAY/Suffolk University polling data from Florida , highlighting potential issues for the former president. Elon Musk sat down with former President Donald Trump amid tech issues on X . USA TODAY Health Reporter Karen Weintraub explains why millions of bird flu vaccines are being prepped . Plus, read more from the front lines of bird flu . Scientists say they've found evidence of liquid water on Mars .

Hit play on the player below to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript beneath it. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.

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Taylor Wilson:

Good morning. I'm Taylor Wilson, and today is Tuesday, August 13th, 2024. This is The Excerpt.

Today, the latest on the Trump campaign hack. Plus what new polling tells us about Trump and Harris in Florida. And millions of bird flu vaccines are being prepped.

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The FBI confirmed yesterday it's investigating allegations that Iranian cyber agents breached Donald Trump's presidential campaign. Trump said on Saturday that Iran had hacked his 2024 political operation, confirming speculation that the Republican nominee was the unnamed victim of a June intrusion that Microsoft had exposed a day earlier. Meanwhile, the Kamala Harris campaign said yesterday that it too was the target of an attack, this one unsuccessful, aimed at breaching its firewall, according to a Washington Post report.

In 2016, Trump opponent Hillary Clinton's campaign was hit by damaging revelations after Russian hackers breached the Democratic National Committee's email servers. Trump, who had publicly asked Russia to hack Clinton, celebrated that breach and read portions of the emails aloud at a campaign rally.

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A new USA TODAY-Suffolk University survey shows Donald Trump leading Kamala Harris but within the margin of error in Florida. I spoke with USA TODAY-Trump campaign reporter Zach Anderson for more.

Zach, thanks for hopping on.

Zach Anderson:

Happy to be here.

Taylor Wilson:

So Zach, starting with this... How are Donald Trump and Kamala Harris doing in the Sunshine state according to this USA TODAY-Suffolk University survey?

Zach Anderson:

Yeah, so the top line from the survey is that Trump is leading Harris by five percentage points. In Florida, talking to the pollster, he was surprised by that. Florida is a state that increasingly has gone red. You saw Trump win the state pretty handily in 2020. And then DeSantis just blew out his Democratic opponent in 2022 in his reelection bid for governor by 19 percentage points. So five points, it's actually within the poll's margin of error. It's closer than the pollster thought it might be. And his takeaway was that Harris is actually within striking distance, and this is a bit of a warning sign for Trump.

Taylor Wilson:

So Zach, we know enthusiasm is a big factor in terms of getting people to get out and vote in the first place. How did supporters of both Trump and Harris land in this polling when it came to enthusiasm, and how do those numbers compare with enthusiasm around Biden before he dropped out?

Zach Anderson:

Yeah, enthusiasm is huge and we're really seeing more enthusiasm for Harris than we saw for Biden. Trump's voters have always been fairly enthusiastic. The survey found that 89% of Trump supporters in Florida are either very enthusiastic or somewhat enthusiastic to vote for him. So you're talking about nearly 90% of his voters are pretty fired up and gung-ho to go out there and pull the lever for Trump. But interestingly, Harris' enthusiasm levels among her supporters are just as high at 89%, and that's a change from Biden. We don't have Florida numbers, but we have national numbers for Biden from the USA TODAY/Suffolk survey from June. And that found that only about 60% of Biden supporters were enthusiastic to vote for him. So Harris is about 30 points higher than that, and that's a big deal. And we see that on the campaign trail where Harris, she's raising a lot of money. And really she's attracting some of the biggest crowds that we've seen for Democrats in years and much bigger crowds than Biden was attracting.

Taylor Wilson:

So Donald Trump has been president. Kamala Harris of course is vice president currently. How did folks land in terms of their thoughts and feelings on job performance for these candidates?

Zach Anderson:

Yeah, and this is a good sign for Trump in the survey. When you look at favorability rating and job performance, which are two separate things they measure, "Do you view somebody favorably?" basically. And also, "Do you think they did a good job while in office?" Trump's favorability rating was above Harris, and his job approval rating when he was president was above the job approval rating that Harris has amongst Florida voters as vice president. For Harris, the silver lining is that she does have a stronger favorability rating than Biden did. So she's viewed more favorably in Florida than Biden, but not more so than Trump. And those are pretty decent indicators of how voters are going to vote. If they view you favorably, if they think you did a good job, then they're obviously more likely to vote for you.

Taylor Wilson:

Zach, what do we know about independent voters and their role here? And also how big a factor is RFK shaking out to be as a potential third party wrinkle in Florida?

Zach Anderson:

He's a significant factor. He's getting 5% of the vote in Florida right now. That is notable. That's pretty big for an independent candidate. And right now Trump is losing independent voters to Harris. That's not necessarily surprising. Biden won independent voters over Trump in 2020. But RFK is certainly a wild card here, and if more voters go to him, that could pull from obviously Trump or Harris.

Taylor Wilson:

Fascinating findings. Zach Anderson covers Donald Trump and Republicans for USA TODAY. Thank you, Zach.

Zach Anderson:

Thank you.

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Taylor Wilson:

Elon Musk conducted a friendly interview yesterday with his endorsed 2024 presidential candidate Republican Donald Trump on Musk's X website, formerly known as Twitter. But that was only after X was able to broadcast it after a glitch delayed the start by about 40 minutes. Many X users couldn't hear anything when the broadcast began last night, blocked by internet denial of service problems that have plagued the website in previous events. When things did get running, Musk spent much of the time by asking about the GOP nominee's assassination attempt and discussing their mutual opposition to illegal border crossings.

Trump also again announced he will soon be traveling back to Butler, Pennsylvania, the site of last month's shooting. In his questioning, Musk, who endorsed Trump last month, allowed him to attack Democratic opponent Kamala Harris and President Joe Biden without any pushback on issues like the economy and tense foreign relations.

Many Trump supporters on social media seemed pleased with the two-hour conversation, with several saying the Republican nominee broke the internet. Aides to Harris called the interview little more than a paid advertisement for the former president. You can read more with a link in today's show notes.

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Millions of bird flu vaccines are being prepped, but will they be needed? I caught up with USA TODAY health reporter, Karen Weintraub for the latest.

Karen, thanks for hopping on.

Karen Weintraub:

Thanks for having me.

Taylor Wilson:

So Karen, let's just start with this. Really, what is the latest on the spread of bird flu in the US?

Karen Weintraub:

13 farm workers have come down with it this year. Basically, they haven't been super, super sick, but they've had conjunctivitis, super red gross eyes, respiratory illnesses, things like that. So it's considered mild because they haven't been hospitalized. That doesn't mean they haven't been sick, but they haven't been really, really ill.

Taylor Wilson:

So officials are now preparing millions of bird flu vaccines. What's the latest here, and what do we know about these efforts?

Karen Weintraub:

They're getting these doses ready just in case. They don't think it's time yet to start vaccinating even the farm workers who are the most exposed to this virus. And there are a number of reasons for that. Basically these farm workers aren't getting that sick, that they're not passing it to each other or to their family members. So it's not super contagious, it's not super serious, and it's not changing that rapidly. So there's not a really high concern yet that the general public is at high risk. So that's why they're not vaccinating yet. At this point, Tamiflu, things like that, are helping contain this virus, any illnesses that result in it. So the need for a vaccine is not there yet, according to these federal officials.

Taylor Wilson:

So as you said, the need not there yet. Really, how is the government viewing vaccination at this point? What's the general approach, and what's the thought process here going forward?

Karen Weintraub:

The general approach is to be prepared but not afraid, I guess. So they want to make these vaccines to have them ready if the situation changes. But we're not in a crisis yet. They don't feel like the need is there yet to be distributing these vaccines. Some public health experts disagree. They think that more should be given out in a clinical trial process. There are clinical trials underway at the moment. Very early stages, given to healthy people, not at high risk, just to see if they mount a response. But some public health experts think it should be a little more broad-based. That's not happening yet.

Taylor Wilson:

Yes. As you mentioned, human trials have begun. When can we expect results there and really what's next for these vaccines going forward?

Karen Weintraub:

Yeah, that usually takes a couple of months. These are very early Phase One to make sure they're safe. And again, that these people's immune systems mount the expected response to the vaccines. Those take a while. Then they do it in a few more people and then a few more people. The concern also is that the virus, if it does adapt to be contagious from person to person, the virus itself might change, and then the vaccines maybe won't be so effective. So that's why, again, they're not distributing it widely at this point.

Early days. They're trying to be cautious. They're trying to be ready. One of the problems in previous outbreaks has been getting the manufacturing going, so they want to kind of work the kinks out now, be ready to manufacture these things at high volume if the need arises. And so that's why they've produced these 4.8 million doses at this point. But they don't think the need is there yet to mass produce them for the general public.

Taylor Wilson:

All right, Karen Weintraub covers health for USA TODAY. Thank you, Karen.

Karen Weintraub:

Thank you.

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Taylor Wilson:

Scientists announced yesterday that for the first time they found evidence of liquid water on Mars, which they say is buried in cracks several miles under the red planet's surface. This is the best evidence yet that Mars still has liquid water in addition to frozen water at its poles, according to the University of California, San Diego Scripps Institution of Oceanography, which led the research.

Finding water on Mars is not itself a new discovery, since we know the planet's polar regions are full of ice. But the new research paves the way for future study into the planet's habitability. Scientists say there's enough water on Mars to fill oceans on the planet's surface.

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Thanks for listening to The Excerpt. You can get the podcast wherever you get your audio. And if you're on a smart speaker, just ask for The Excerpt. I'm Taylor Wilson and I'll be back tomorrow with more of The Excerpt from USA TODAY.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: FBI probes Trump hack, Harris team says it was also targeted | The Excerpt