Latest on the 2024 presidential election

Former President Donald Trump has delivered a barrage of lies and distortions about the federal response to Hurricane Helene.

While various misinformation about the response has spread widely without Trump's involvement, the Republican presidential nominee has been one of the country's leading deceivers on the subject. Over a span of six days, in public comments and social media posts, Trump has used his powerful megaphone to endorse or invent false or unsubstantiated claims.

The chief targets of his hurricane-related dishonesty have been Vice President Kamala Harris, his opponent in the November presidential election, and President Joe Biden.

Monday: Trump falsely claims Biden hasn't answered calls from Georgia's governor

During a visit to Georgia on Monday, Trump said of Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp: "He's been calling the president, hasn't been able to get him."

It was immediately clear that Trump's claim was false. Kemp, a Republican, told reporters earlier Monday that he had spoken with Biden the day prior — and that it was Kemp who had initially missed a call from Biden, not the other way around.

Kemp told reporters that he had successfully called Biden right back. Kemp added: "He just said, 'Hey, what do you need?' And I told him, you know, 'We got what we need. We'll work through the federal process.' He offered that if there's other things we need, just to call him directly, which — I appreciate that. But we've had FEMA embedded with us since a day or two before the storm hit in our state operations center in Atlanta; we've got a great relationship with them."

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Top aides to Kamala Harris are heading into the final month of the 2024 presidential race still wrestling with how much distance she can credibly claim from Joe Biden as she looks for more ways to weave in breaks with him on the campaign trail.

But she keeps getting pulled back to his side for official business at the White House — and he keeps injecting himself into the conversation.

Harris aides are looking at rolling out new plans and promises for what Harris would do as president, in part to directly demonstrate notable differences, like in her recent more blunt speeches about abortion rights and tackling the southern border.

Running as an extension of the president is not a strong position, Harris aides know, while asserting what she stands for is.

Neither aides in the Harris campaign nor the Biden White House would commit to another joint campaign event between now and the election.

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It's the final month of the 2024 presidential election , an affair that has felt bonkers for months.

Americans witnessed the sitting Democratic president drop out of the race, the Republican nominee narrowly escape an assassination attempt and the rise of the first woman of color on a national ticket.

Money isn't everything in politics, but it's certainly not nothing. Where the campaigns — and the super PACs that support them — spend funds is, if nothing else, a good indicator of where they see opportunity.

CNN's David Wright who tracks spending, has noted how the Harris campaign focused her spending in the first week of October on the critical "blue wall" states of Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin. Trump has been looking to the Sun Belt, but also spent the most on ads in Pennsylvania, proving it's a linchpin to both sides' strategies.

How are the two sides getting out the vote? The policy proposals have been rolled out, and the candidates have tried to define each other. Now it's time to get voters to the polls or the mailbox.

Voting early and by mail is already underway in much of the country, although early voting is not expected to reach the same level as it did in the Covid-19 pandemic election of 2020. Trump remains a mail-voting skeptic, but Republicans are embracing the practice in key states this year in an effort to keep pace with Democrats.

Who is on the campaign trail? Harris has supporters to the left and supporters to the right, from popular high-profile Democrats like former President Barack Obama to disaffected anti-Trump Republicans like former Rep. Liz Cheney.

Trump will get bold-face support from the world's richest man, Elon Musk, but overall has fewer surrogates to turn to.

Read more here on what to watch.