CNN: “The FBI said in a letter Tuesday night that it had ‘nothing to add’ to comments this week by the Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, who said there was ‘no intelligence to support’ that Russian disinformation efforts were connected to recently surfaced emails that have been behind stories critical of Hunter Biden and his father Joe Biden.”

“In a carefully worded letter, Jill C. Tyson, FBI assistant director for congressional affairs, wrote in response to questions from Homeland Security Committee Chairman Ron Johnson that ‘we have nothing to add at this time to the October 19th public statement by the Director of National Intelligence about the available actionable intelligence.’ Ratcliffe, during an appearance on Fox Business, said there was “no intelligence to support” claims that Russian disinformation were behind the articles in the New York Post that have been seized upon by President Donald Trump, Republican allies in Congress and conservative media in the closing weeks of the election. CNN has not determined the authenticity of the emails.”

“Now that President Trump has gone on the attack against CBS’s Lesley Stahl, some observers appear puzzled: Why would Trump squander his final chance to close his big polling gap with Joe Biden on unhinged public fights rather than on winning back voters who’ve been alienated by exactly these sorts of meltdowns?”

“The fact that this comes after Trump waged a public assault on Anthony S. Fauci, his own leading infectious-disease expert, only seems to compound the folly here, since voters are surely looking to the popular Fauci for advice with the coronavirus again spiking around the country. But in a very real sense people such as Stahl and Fauci actually are the chief opponents Trump must contend with in the campaign’s final days. They are the figures he perceives to be standing in the way of his effort to conduct this campaign in an entirely invented universe that he’d hoped to manufacture for this very purpose” – Greg Sargent.

Josh Marshall: “We are rightly focusing on President Trump last night telling rally goers he’d never be in their dump of a town if the election weren’t going so badly for him. But let’s not miss the more important and lasting part of this message. President Trump is already previewing one explanation and justification for his defeat: COVID. He was cruising toward reelection, he claims, when COVID struck. For him, there’s the added feature that it was the handiwork of his purported arch-enemy China. There’s no question that President Trump’s catastrophic handling of the pandemic has damaged his standing and chances of reelection.”

“Of course, we don’t know President Trump is going to lose today, let alone from the vantage point of eight or twelve months ago. The whole dialogue of whether or not COVID did Trump in can seem like a trivial kind of score-settling, whether a Trump loss was ‘fair’ or ‘unfair’ somehow. But it’s a conversation that still merits our attention because it is likely to figure strongly in political developments after a Trump defeat, if in fact he is defeated in two weeks.”

My father, @MelBrooks, is 94. He has never made a political video. Until now. #MelBrooks4JoeBiden#BidenHarris#GrassrootsDemHQ pic.twitter.com/yQZhopSbNV

— Max Brooks (@maxbrooksauthor) October 21, 2020

Texas: Biden 47 – Trump 47
Pennsylvania: Biden 51 – Trump 43
Texas Senate: Cornyn 49 – Hegar 43
Read more at Qunnipiac University polls.

Oscar the Grouch here with an important reminder to let your voice be heard. That's right, I want to hear YOUR voice. I can't believe it either. #Vote2020 pic.twitter.com/kcsCbz4iZa

— Oscar the Grouch (@OscarTheGrouch) October 21, 2020

Senator Joni Ernst leads challenger Theresa Greenfield 45 to 44. Read more here.

New York Times: “A man in Maryland has been arrested on charges that he threatened to kidnap and kill Joseph R. Biden Jr., the Democratic presidential nominee, and his running mate, Senator Kamala Harris, law enforcement officials said on Wednesday. A criminal complaint filed by the Secret Service on Wednesday did not describe any steps taken by the man, identified as James Dale Reed, to carry out the alleged threat. It said that on Oct. 4, Mr. Reed approached a house in his hometown, Frederick, Md., northwest of Washington, that had Biden-Harris campaign signs in the yard and left a handwritten note that contained graphic threats against the candidates and their supporters. ‘We are the ones with these scary guns, we are the ones your children have nightmares about,’ the note read in part. Mr. Reed, 42, was arrested last Friday and is being held without bond in Frederick County, Md., according to court records. A spokeswoman for the Maryland Office of the Public Defender, which is representing Mr. Reed, declined to comment.”

“Ron Johnson, the senator from Wisconsin who has led the Republican campaign in the Senate of making unfounded claims about Joe Biden’s son Hunter, is facing a host of questions about his own ethics, including whether he personally benefited from a change in tax law that he sought in 2017. A letter sent by Johnson to the Senate ethics committee in May has revealed the senator began the process of selling a company he partly owned in February 2018, just months after he insisted the Trump administration change a portion of the tax law in a way that ultimately benefited the sale.”

“The issue has become a focus of the Congressional Integrity Project, a Democratic watchdog group that is seeking to expose allegations of corruption within the Republican ranks. At the center of claims made by the watchdog group are allegations that Johnson may have sought out a change in the Trump administration’s 2017 tax bill to enrich himself personally” – The Guardian.

Politico: “A federal judge ruled Wednesday that a pair of tweets President Donald Trump issued earlier this month that appeared to call for the declassification of all documents related to the probe of Russian influence on the 2016 presidential election won’t trigger any further release of information to the public. U.S. District Court Judge Reggie Walton lamented the president’s sweeping language, but said a clarification White House chief of staff Mark Meadows submitted to the court Tuesday amounted to a retraction of the tweets.”

Former New York mayor, current Trump lawyer and perpetual Nosferatu cosplayer Rudy Giuliani allegedly reaches into his pants to fondle his genitals during a scene with an actress playing Borat’s daughter in the new satirical movie, the Guardian reports.

During a scene with the actress playing Borat’s daughter, who is a journalist in the movie, Giuliani reclines onto a bed, puts his hands down his pants and apparently plays with himself during the interview.The actress, Irina Nowak, whose character supposedly works for a conservative news outlet, invites Giuliani to her hotel suite for a drink after completing an interview in the hotel.  The suite was covered with hidden cameras and microphones.

Dr. Scott Atlas, the neuroradiologist and former Fox “News” commentator who’s become President Trump’s key advisor on coronavirus response even though he has no public health or epidemiology background, said that the medical professionals from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health have “limited” perspectives on how to deal with the pandemic, and he claimed that, despite Trump’s public speculation on “herd mentality (immunity),” it’s never been discussed in the White House.

In an interview with Unherd, Atlas bragged about being the lone voice speaking out against the advice of people experienced in public health and virology, saying that people are speaking out against his position because he sides with the president.

“When I [went to work for Trump] though, I knew I would be vilified, because in the US there are a lot of people who think that this President is radioactive, so there is a massive destruction that ensues immediately when you associate with this President,” Atlas said.  “It’s a very sad statement on America, on American culture, on the world — these people are blinded, even scientists, to the data because they despise the political side of this. And they have a massive ego, and can’t admit they’re wrong. Ok I’m a contrarian, I’m used to being a contrarian, I’m proud to be an outlier when the inliers are wrong.”

Politico: “There’s a great deal of attention in the news media about a potential blue wave that could see Biden sweep states like Georgia and Texas, but inside the Biden campaign and among top Democrats, there is extreme caution. ‘All of us are suffering from PTSD so nobody is overly confident in these poll numbers,’ said a former top member of the Obama administration and confidante of Hillary Clinton. ‘Nobody I know is saying there’s an 80 percent chance this guy is going to be president. God bless America if there’s a wave coming, and I’ll be glad to jump on a surfboard, but these numbers are too close.'”

“The conventional wisdom of those who are willing to believe the polls was summed up by Dylan Loewe, who was a speechwriter for Biden and a book ghostwriter for Kamala Harris. ‘I think Trump’s attacks on mail voting are going to backfire spectacularly,’ he said. ‘So I think this wave is going to be a few feet taller than the polls suggest. But I still get into a fetal position when I think about it. I do think Biden will win Texas. I think we’ll win the Kansas Senate seat. I think Alaska’s in play. And I think the Democrats will win enough state delegations in the house to prevent the house from installing Trump in a contingent election. You can put this on the record if you want. If Trump wins, the last thing on my mind will be my shitty predictions.'”

“A senior intel official tells The Federalist: Just so everyone understands, the people who actually have access to evidence and intel (DNI/DOJ) say the laptop isn’t a Russian op. The people who don’t (Schiff) say it is. But which of these groups is the media breathlessly reporting on?'” – Federalist co-founder Sean Davis via Twitter.

“President Trump and Democrat Joe Biden are in a near tie in Arizona, a state Trump carried by three-and-a-half points in 2016. A new Rasmussen Reports telephone and online survey of Likely Voters in Arizona shows Biden leading Trump 48% to 46%. Three percent (3%) prefer some other candidate, while another three percent (3%) remain undecided. Factor in those who haven’t made up their minds yet but are leaning toward one candidate or the other, and Biden has a minimal 48% to 47% lead” – Rasmussen.

Theresa Greenfield leads Sen. Joni Ernst 49 to 47. Read more here.

CBS News: “Pope Francis endorsed same-sex civil unions for the first time as pope while being interviewed for the feature-length documentary ‘Francesco,’ which had its premiere at the Rome Film Festival on Wednesday. The papal thumbs-up came midway through the film that delves into issues he cares about most, including the environment, poverty, migration, racial and income inequality, and the people most affected by discrimination.’Homosexual people have the right to be in a family. They are children of God,’ Francis said in one of his sit-down interviews for the film. ‘What we have to have is a civil union law; that way they are legally covered.’ While serving as archbishop of Buenos Aires, Francis endorsed civil unions for gay couples as an alternative to same-sex marriages. However, he had never come out publicly in favor of civil unions as pope.”