Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton (R) shakes hands with Republican nominee Donald Trump after the first presidential debate at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York.
WASHINGTON, DC, USA (AP) — Here is a look at where Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump stand on crucial issues, as they enter the final round of campaigning for the November 8 presidential election:
Abortion
Persistent Republican-led efforts to restrict access to abortion and to curb government funding for Planned Parenthood have been hotly debated in Washington and in states. The issue will be shaped in some way by the next president and could be shaped profoundly if the election winner manages to tip the balance of the Supreme Court.
Trump, in the third and final presidential debate, said he would appoint justices open to overturning Roe v Wade, the 1973 decision that established a constitutional right to abortion. Clinton vowed to appoint justices who would uphold that ruling, saying: “We have come too far to have that turned back now.”
Child care/pay equity
In much of the US, families spend more on child care for two kids than on housing. And if you’re a woman, it’s likely you earn less than your male colleagues. That’s according to the latest research, which suggests that while the US economy has improved, women and their families are still struggling to make the numbers work.
Women comprise about 57 per cent of the labour force and many of them have young children. If they aren’t getting paid enough to make ends meet, more families will seek out government aid programmes or low-quality, unlicensed day care for their children.
Clinton wants a 12-week government-paid family and medical leave programme, guaranteeing workers two-thirds of their wages up to a certain amount. Trump proposes six weeks of leave for new mothers, with the government paying wages equivalent to unemployment benefits.
Both candidates propose tax relief for child care costs. Trump’s plan provides for a new income tax deduction for child care expenses, other tax benefits and a new rebate or tax credit for low-income families. Clinton says no family should spend more than 10 per cent of its income on child care. She would double the child tax credit for families with children four and younger, to $2,000 per child.
China
Tensions have been rising over China’s assertive behaviour in the seas of Asia. The US also accuses China of unfair trading practices and cyber theft of business secrets.
Trump says that the sheer volume of trade gives the US leverage over China. He accuses China of undervaluing its currency to make its exports artificially cheap, and proposes tariffs as high as 45 per cent on Chinese imports if Beijing doesn’t change its behaviour. Such action could risk a trade war that would make many products in the US more expensive.
Clinton says the US needs to press the rising Asian power to play by international rules, whether on trade or territorial disputes.
While many of China’s neighbours are unnerved by its military build-up, the wider world needs the US and China to get along, to tackle global problems. The US and China are also economically inter-dependent, and punishment by one party could end up hurting the other.
Climate change
It’s as if Trump and Clinton live on two entirely different Earths: one warming, one not. Clinton says climate change threatens us all, while Trump repeatedly tweets that global warming is a hoax.
Measurements and scientists say Clinton’s Earth is much closer to the warming reality. And it is worsening.
From May 2015 to August 2016, 16 months in a row set records globally for heat, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The world is on pace to break the record for hottest year, a record already broken in 2010, 2014 and 2015. It is about 1.8 degrees warmer than a century ago.
But it’s more than temperatures. Scientists have connected man-made climate change to deadly heat waves, droughts and flood-inducing downpours. Studies say climate change is raising sea levels, melting ice and killing coral. It’s making people sicker with asthma and allergies and may eventually shrink our bank accounts.
Trump calls attempts to remedy global warming “just a very, very expensive form of tax”.
Clinton proposes to spend $60 billion to switch from dirty fossil fuels to cleaner energy. She promises to deliver on President Barack Obama’s pledge that by 2025, the US will be emitting 30 per cent less heat-trapping gases than in 2005.
Debt
The federal government is borrowing about one out of seven dollars it spends and steadily piling up debt — to the tune of about $14 trillion held by investors. Over the long term, that threatens the economy and people’s pocketbooks.
Most economists say rising debt risks crowding out investment and forcing interest rates up, among other problems. At the same time, rapidly growing spending on federal health care programmes like Medicare and the drain on Social Security balances caused by the rising tide of baby boomers could squeeze out other spending, on roads, education, the armed forces and more.
It takes spending cuts, tax increases or both to dent the deficit. Lawmakers instead prefer higher spending and tax cuts.
Neither Clinton nor Trump has focused on the debt.
Trump has promised massive tax cuts that would drive up the debt and he’s shown no interest in curbing expensive benefit programmes like Medicare.
Clinton, by contrast, is proposing tax increases on the wealthy. But she wouldn’t use the money to bring down the debt. Instead, she’d turn around and spend it on college tuition subsidies, infrastructure and health care.
Education
The US has some 50 million K-12 students. Teaching them, preparing them for college and careers, costs taxpayers more than $580 billion a year, or about $11,670 per pupil per year. A better education usually translates into higher earnings.
And while high school graduations are up sharply and dropout rates down, the nation has a ways to go to match the educational outcomes elsewhere. American schoolchildren trail their counterparts in Japan, Korea, Germany, France and elsewhere.
Clinton wants to make preschool universal for all four-year-old children within 10 years by providing new federal dollars to states. Trump proposes to spend $20 billion during his first year in office to help states expand school choice programmes. He wants states to divert an additional $110 billion of their own education money to help parents who want their children to go to other schools.
Energy
Energy independence has been a goal of every president since Richard Nixon. Clinton and Trump have very different ways to get there. How energy is produced and where it comes from affect jobs, the economy and the environment.
Domestic production of all types of energy except coal has boomed in recent years, spurred by improved drilling techniques such as fracking and discoveries of vast oil supplies in North Dakota and natural gas in states such as Pennsylvania, Ohio, New York and West Virginia.
Clinton vows to continue the boom while ensuring the US generates enough renewable energy to power every home in America within 10 years.
Trump vows to “unleash American energy”, allowing unfettered production of oil, coal, natural gas and other sources to push the US toward energy independence and create jobs.
Both Clinton and Trump support natural gas, a cleaner alternative to coal. Trump calls for rescinding the Clean Power Plan, a key element of President Barack Obama’s strategy to fight climate change. Clinton is committed to Obama’s climate-change goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by up to 30 per cent by 2025.
Foreign policy
How the US uses its influence as the world’s sole superpower is a central feature of presidential power.
It can mean taking the country to war — to protect the homeland or to defend an ally. Or it can mean using diplomacy to prevent war. It can affect US jobs, too, as choices arise either to expand trade deals or to erect barriers to protect US markets.
In the contest between Clinton and Trump, America’s role in the world is a point of sharp differences. Each says the US must be the predominant power, but they would exercise leadership differently. Trump calls his approach “America first,” meaning alliances and coalitions would not pass muster unless they produced a net benefit to the US. Clinton sees international partnerships as essential tools for using US influence and lessening the chances of war.
These divergent views could mean very different approaches to the military fight and ideological struggle against the Islamic State, the future of Afghanistan and Iraq, the contest with China for influence in Asia and the Pacific, and growing nervousness in Europe over Russian aggression.
Guns
The right to bear arms is carved into the Constitution and seemingly embedded in the national DNA. But after a seemingly endless stretch of violence, Americans are confronting how far those rights extend.
Do Americans have the right to have AR-style firearms, the long guns with a military look used in the past year in several mass shootings? Should they be able to buy magazines that hold 10 or more bullets? Should every gun buyer have to pass a background check?
Trump casts himself as an ardent protector of gun rights and proclaims that if more “good guys” were armed there would be fewer gun tragedies. He’s made fealty to the Second Amendment a quality he wants in Supreme Court nominees.
Clinton wants to renew an expired ban on assault-type weapons instituted when her husband was president. She’s also called for measures to ensure background checks are completed before a gun sale goes forward, mandating such checks for gun-show sales and repealing a law that shields gun manufacturers from liability.
Health care
About nine in 10 Americans now have health insurance, more than at any time in history. But progress is incomplete, and the future far from certain. Rising costs could bedevil the next occupant of the White House.
Millions of people previously shut out have been covered by President Barack Obama’s health care law. No one can be denied coverage anymore because of a pre-existing condition. But “Obamacare” remains divisive, and premiums for next year are rising sharply in many communities. As well, some major insurers are leaving the programme.
Whether Americans would be better off trading for a GOP plan is another question. Recent studies found Trump’s proposal would make 18 million to 20 million people uninsured. GOP congressional leaders have a more comprehensive approach, but key details are still missing.
Overall health care spending is trending higher again, and prices for prescription drugs — new and old — are a major worry.
Medicare’s insolvency date has moved up by two years — to 2028.
Clinton would stay the course, adjusting as needed. Republicans are united on repealing Obama’s law, but it’s unclear how they would replace it.
Immigration
The future of millions of people living in the US illegally could well be shaped by the presidential election. The stakes are high, too, for those who employ them, help them fit into neighbourhoods, or want them gone.
Trump at first pledged to deport the estimated 11 million immigrants in the country illegally. Not only that, he’d build a wall all along the Mexican border. But his position has evolved. He’s sticking to his vow to build the wall and make Mexico pay. But he’s no longer proposing to deport people who have not committed crimes beyond their immigration offences. Still, he’s not proposing a way for people living in the country illegally to gain legal status.
Clinton, in contrast, would overhaul immigration laws to include a path to citizenship, not just legal status.
Illegal immigration has been at nearly 40-year lows for several years. It even appears that Mexican migration trends have reversed, with more Mexicans leaving the US than arriving. Billions of dollars have been spent in recent years to build fencing, improve border technology and expand the Border Patrol.
Nonetheless the Mexican border remains a focal point for those who argue that the country is not secure.
Jobs
Tepid income growth and a smaller share of the population at work have kept many Americans anxious about jobs and the economy, seven years after the Great Recession ended.
And most jobs that pay decent wages require more education than in the past, leaving many workers feeling left behind.
Trump says he would cut regulations and taxes to spur more hiring, and renegotiate or withdraw from trade agreements to bring jobs back to the US.
Clinton says she would spend more on roads, tunnels, and other infrastructure and make state colleges and universities tuition free to most students.
Even though hiring has been healthy for the past six years, incomes have lagged. A typical household didn’t see its income recover to pre-recession levels until just this past July. And the proportion of Americans working or looking for work remains below pre-recession levels, as some of the unemployed have given up searching for jobs.
Minimum wage
Modest income gains, strikes by fast-food workers, the rapid growth of low-paying jobs while middle-income work shrinks. These factors have combined to make the minimum wage a top economic issue for the 2016 campaign.
Millions would benefit from higher pay, of course. But an increase in the minimum wage would also boost costs for employers and may slow hiring.
Clinton supports raising the minimum wage at least to $12 an hour, even higher at state and local levels. Trump has said he supports an increase to $10, but thinks states should “really call the shots.” It’s $7.25 now.
Why the momentum for higher minimums? The typical household’s income has fallen 2.4 per cent since 1999. Low-paying industries, such as retail, fast food and home health care aides, are among the largest and fastest-growing. And many low-wage workers are older, have families and are probably more willing to demand higher pay.
Money in politics
Voters are disgusted with the way political races are paid for — disproportionately by big-money donors, including those who stand to gain or lose from government decisions. The rules even allow donors to hide their identities by giving to politically active nonprofit groups that don’t file detailed public paperwork about their finances.
The system leaves everyday Americans fearing that their voices are being drowned out by these moneyed interests.
So far, donors have pumped more than $1.7 billion into the presidential race, according to an
Associated Press tally.
Both presidential candidates talk a good game when it comes to money in politics, but both fail to back their words with action.
Clinton and Trump denounce big money in politics, but they are both largely funded with big money. Trump also has no proposals addressing campaign finance, while Clinton’s are vague and difficult to execute.
Race and policing
The continued deaths of unarmed African-Americans at the hands of police are turning into one of the most consequential civil rights issues of the new millennium. Since the death in 2014 of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, the sharing of video-recorded deaths of African-Americans at the hands of law enforcement has sparked unrest in many cities around the country, and prompted calls for additional training and more monitoring of police forces.
Clinton has offered specific proposals, including legislation that would help end racial profiling, providing federal matching funds for more police body cameras and overhauling mandatory minimum sentencing.
Trump has described himself as the “law and order” candidate, and has not specifically addressed plans on race and policing. He endorsed a former New York City police policy called “stop and frisk” after unrest in Charlotte, North Carolina, over the police shooting of Keith Lamont Scott.
Student debt
More Americans are getting buried by student debt, causing delays in home ownership and limiting how much money people can save and leaving taxpayers at risk as many loans go unpaid.
Student debt now totals around $1.26 trillion. This amounts to a stunning 350 per cent increase since 2005, according to the New York Federal Reserve.
More than 60 per cent of the class of 2014 graduated with debt that averaged nearly $27,000, according to the College Board. Not all that taxpayer-backed debt is getting repaid. Out of the 43 million Americans with student debt, roughly 16 per cent are in long-term default — a potential hit in excess of $100 billion that taxpayers would absorb.
Clinton proposes no tuition for students from families making less than $85,000 who go to an in-state, public college. That threshold would rise to $125,000 by 2021. Trump promises to cap payments at 12.5 per cent of a borrower’s income, with loan forgiveness if they make payments for 15 years.
Supreme Court
The ideological direction of the Supreme Court is going to tip one way or the other after the election. The outcome could sway decisions on issues that profoundly affect Americans: immigration, gun control, climate change and more.
The court has been operating with eight justices since Antonin Scalia died in February. His successor appears unlikely to be confirmed until after the election, at the earliest. The court is split between four Democratic-appointed, liberal justices and four conservatives who were appointed by Republicans — although Justice Anthony Kennedy has sided with the liberals on abortion, same-sex marriage and affirmative action in the past two years.
The ninth justice will push the court left or right, depending on whether Democrat Hillary Clinton or Republican Donald Trump becomes president. President Barack Obama has nominated Merrick Garland to take Scalia’s seat, but the Republican Senate has refused to consider Garland’s nomination, in an effort to prevent a liberal court majority.
Taxes
Presidents like to try reshaping the tax code to make substantive changes in fiscal policy and to show voters their priorities.
Both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton have made clear that that’s just what they want to do. There’s an enormous difference between their approaches and goals.
Trump, the Republican, is intent on cutting taxes. He’d collapse the current seven income tax brackets, which peak at 39.6 per cent, into just three tiers with a top rate of 33 per cent, slice the corporate income tax and eliminate the estate tax. Analysts say the wealthy would benefit disproportionately.
Clinton, the Democrat, is proposing tax increases on the rich, including a minimum 30 percent tax on incomes over $1 million and higher taxes on big inheritances. Most taxpayers would see little or no impact on their tax bill, but the government might look different. She’d use the added revenue to expand domestic programmes.
Trade
In this angry election year, many American voters are sceptical about free trade — or hostile to it.
The backlash threatens a pillar of US policy: The United States has long sought global trade.
Economists say imports cut prices for consumers and make the US more efficient.
But unease has simmered, especially as American workers faced competition from low-wage Chinese labour. Last year, the US ran a $334 billion trade deficit with China — $500 billion with the entire world.
The Democratic and Republican presidential candidates are both playing to public suspicions about trade deals. Hillary Clinton broke with President Barack Obama by opposing an Asia-Pacific trade agreement that she had supported as secretary of state.
Donald Trump vows to tear up existing trade deals and to slap huge tariffs on Chinese imports.