The Headlines - Inside Trump-Harris Debate Prep, and Israel Strikes Humanitarian Zone

Episode Date: September 10, 2024

Plus, remembering an iconic Hollywood voice.   Tune in every weekday morning. To get our full audio journalism and storytelling experience, download the New York Times Audio app — available to Times news subscribers on iOS — and sign up for our weekly newsletter.Tell us what you think at: [e-mail]. On Today’s Episode:Inside the Trump-Harris Debate Prep: Method Acting, Insults, Tough Questions, by Jonathan Swan, Maggie Haberman, Katie Rogers and Reid J. EpsteinTrump Steps Up Threats to Imprison Those He Sees as Foes, by Charlie Savage, Maggie Haberman, Jonathan Swan and Michael GoldIsrael Strikes Humanitarian Area; Gazan Authorities Say Dozens Are Killed, by Ephrat Livni and Rawan Sheikh AhmadWildfire Erupts in Orange County, Forcing Evacuations, by Soumya KarlamanglaApple Unveils New iPhones With Built-In Artificial Intelligence, by Tripp MickleJames Earl Jones, Whose Powerful Acting Resonated Onstage and Onscreen, Dies at 93, by Robert D. McFadden

From The New York Times, it's The Headlines. I'm Traci Mumford. Today's Tuesday, September 10th. Here's what we're covering. Tonight in Philadelphia, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump will take the stage for what could be the most consequential 90 minutes of the presidential race. It's the only debate the two campaigns have agreed to so far, and it comes as the candidates are nearly tied in the polls. The debate will be moderated by David Muir and Lindsay Davis of ABC News. There will be no live audience, and the candidates' mics will be muted when it's not their turn to speak.

My colleagues and I have been reporting on how Donald Trump and Kamala Harris have been preparing for tonight's debate, and their preparations could not have been more different. Times political reporter Jonathan Swan has been covering the 2024 campaign. Kamala Harris has been holed up in a hotel with her team doing highly choreographed debate sessions. These have included replica television lighting, a stage, and even an advisor in sort of method acting mode playing Donald Trump wearing a boxy suit and the long red tie. On the Trump side, it's much looser. And basically it consists of them sitting around

at his private clubs in Bedminster or Mar-a-Lago. His aides are at a long table, his aides and advisors. He sits in a chair facing them and they bat questions back and forth. He's had some interesting people in there advising him. The Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz, who's been throwing sharp questions at him in these sessions to get under his skin. And the former Democratic Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard from Hawaii, who has actually debated against Kamala Harris in 2019 when both of them were running for the Democratic nomination, she's channeling a little bit of her and offering suggestions in these sessions. The Trump team, strategically, their main objective is to tie Harris to the very unpopular president she serves

under, Joe Biden, and to associate her in voters' minds with the most unpopular aspects of his presidency, specifically high prices at the grocery store, at the gas pump, chaos around the world, particularly the wars in the Middle East and Ukraine, and also the situation at the gas pump, chaos around the world, particularly the wars in the Middle East and Ukraine, and also the situation at the southern border. Harris, on the other hand, her team wants her to appear cool-headed, presidential, and they're hoping to goad Donald Trump into making some of the rash personal attacks that he's done against her publicly and that he's also done in some of his previous debates that have backfired. So the Harris team is hoping to see that version of Trump come out and alienate voters tonight.

The debate starts tonight at 9 p.m. Eastern. You can watch it live on The New York Times app or at NYTimes.com with real-time analysis from Jonathan and the rest of our politics team. Meanwhile, the Times has been tracking how Trump's been increasingly threatening to imprison people he says are working against him. He's vowing that, if re-elected, he'll use the power of the government to punish his perceived enemies. It's rhetoric he's used before, but recently he's expanded his targets and been making more explicit threats. In the last month at rallies and interviews and on social media, Trump has called for Barack Obama to be subject to military tribunals. He's threatened Mark Zuckerberg with

a life sentence for donating money to expand voter access in the 2020 election. And he said that election workers, along with lawyers and donors affiliated with the Harris campaign, could be prosecuted for potential claims of election fraud this fall. When he was president, Trump repeatedly pressed the Justice Department to prosecute his political adversaries. Those efforts largely went nowhere. But if he wins, his allies have already developed a blueprint that would put an area it had designated as a humanitarian zone in southern Gaza. The Israeli military said it was targeting a militant command center there and that it tried to mitigate the risk to civilians. At least 40 people were killed and dozens were injured, according to an official with the civil defense in Gaza.

They say entire families disappeared in the strike, which left three massive craters. Video from the scene showed people searching through the rubble using the lights on their phones. The area, near the city of Han Yunis, had barely anyone living there before the war. Then Israel designated it safe for civilians, and tens of thousands of Palestinians fled there seeking shelter. In Southern California, a wildfire dubbed the Airport Fire erupted in Orange County yesterday afternoon, and it's prompted evacuation orders from suburban neighborhoods. The fire began just east of Irvine, and it's one of several threatening the area right now, as the state goes through a prolonged heat wave that's pushed temperatures past 100 degrees this week. California's already had a difficult fire season.

Two wet winters in a row led to lots of heavy vegetation growing throughout the state. Then the scorching temperatures came through, drying out the brush and turning it into fuel. Apple Intelligence is the personal intelligence system at the heart of the iPhone 16 lineup. At Apple's Silicon Valley headquarters yesterday, the company unveiled the iPhone 16, its first model with artificial intelligence. With the ability to understand and create language, as well as images, and take action on your behalf to simplify daily tasks. While other tech companies have already dived headfirst into AI phones,

Apple's been moving more slowly. Its artificial intelligence system, which it calls Apple Intelligence, will have a few key features. It'll help with things like sorting through messages, offering suggestions or proofreading when you're writing, and it will feature an updated version of Siri, the virtual assistant. This is a big moment for the viability of artificial intelligence. It's something that the entire stock market has gotten swept up in and really enthusiastic about,

but has not really gained traction and adoption. Times tech reporter Trip Mickel covers Apple. So many tech companies have introduced AI products, but not really been able to get customers to spend money to adopt and use those products for a variety of reasons. Apple, on the other hand, often comes to an emerging technology later than its peers and does it in a slicker or more satisfying fashion that winds up getting people to use it. We saw this with digital music players and the iPod. We saw this with smartphones and the iPhone. And we most recently saw this with smartwatches and the Apple Watch. I'll be looking for feedback from customers on

whether or not they're saying that the new features are helpful. Anything that indicates that people are really adopting this and that these aren't just parlor tricks, which is the way a lot of these other features have been treated by other tech companies in the past. And finally... Obi-Wan never told you what happened to your father. James Earl Jones, the legendary actor with one of the most recognizable voices in Hollywood history, has died at age 93.

I am your father. Jones's thundering, rumbling tones gave voice to characters from Darth Vader to the Lion King's Mufasa. Simba, let me tell you something that my father told me. But growing up in rural Michigan, James didn't speak for many years. He stuttered so badly, he basically stopped talking at age eight. Then, in high school, an English teacher coaxed him into writing poetry and reciting it out loud. And we were both shocked. But we also realized we had a way for me to regain the power of speech through reading poetry. So poetry liberated you.

Yes. Poetry turned into theater, and by the 1950s, Jones had moved to New York to be an actor. Over the next half a century, he did everything. He was one of the first Black actors to appear regularly on TV soap operas. He did Shakespeare and August Wilson plays, and he voiced the Star Wars epics, which he originally went uncredited for at his request. He was incredibly prolific, at one point appearing in 18 plays in just two and a half years.

And he was incredibly celebrated, collecting Tonys, Golden Globes, Emmys, and an Oscar nomination. Jones told The Times that basically once he started talking again, he didn't stop, saying, quote, it became a very important thing for me, like making up for lost time, making up for the years that I didn't speak. Those are the headlines. Today on The Run-Up, hear from four undecided voters about what they're hoping to see at tonight's debate. You can listen on the Times audio app or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Tracey Mumford. We'll be back tomorrow.