Former President Donald Trump heads to Montana, and Vice President Kamala Harris says she's interested in an interview.

Trump heads to Montana for rally to try and unseat Democrat Tester after failing to do so in 2018

With control of the Senate potentially at stake, Donald Trump is visiting Montana on Friday hoping to remedy some unfinished business from 2018, when he campaigned repeatedly in Big Sky Country in a failed bid to oust incumbent Democratic Sen. Jon Tester.

Tester has tried to convince voters he's aligned with Trump on many issues, mirroring his successful strategy from six years ago. While that worked in a non-presidential election year, it faces a more critical test this fall with Tester's opponent, former Navy SEAL Tim Sheehy, trying to link the three-term incumbent to Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris.

Harris has benefited nationally from a burst of enthusiasm among core Democratic constituencies, who coalesced quickly around her after President Joe Biden withdrew from the campaign last month. She's drawn big crowds in swing states, touring this week with Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, her choice to be her vice presidential nominee.

Trump's only rally this week, meanwhile, will be in a state he won by 16 percentage points four years ago rather than a November battleground. Facing new pressure in the race from a candidate with surging enthusiasm, Trump on Thursday called questions about his lack of swing state stops "stupid."

"I don't have to go there because I'm leading those states," he said. "I'm going because I want to help senators and congressmen get elected."

He will add on fundraising stops in Wyoming and Colorado.

Harris says she wants to sit for interview by end of month amid GOP attacks that she's avoiding the press

Vice President Kamala Harris told reporters that she wants to get her first interview as the Democratic nominee for president scheduled before the end of August while taking a handful of questions from reporters after a campaign event in Michigan on Thursday. 

“I’ve talked to my team, I want us to get an interview scheduled before the end of the month,” she said on the tarmac before boarding Air Force Two en route to Arizona. 

The new pledge from the vice president to face the press comes as the GOP presidential ticket — in the midst of trying to find its footing against a new Democratic nominee just three months from an election — has been honing in on a new line of attack against Harris: accusing her of dodging questions from the press.

Republican vice presidential nominee Ohio Sen. JD Vance — who was sent to shadow Harris on the campaign trail this week and give his own remarks along the way — put a spotlight on the GOP’s new line of attack when he approached Air Force Two on a tarmac in Wisconsin on Wednesday after his own campaign plane landed, and told reporters that he wanted to “check out my future plane” and ask Harris “why she refuses to answer questions from the media.”

“I at least have enough respect for you all and for the American people to come and talk to you and answer questions,” Vance told reporters. 

The fresh criticism that appeared to build all week culminated on Thursday when Republican presidential nominee, former President Donald Trump, announced last-minute that he would hold a press conference at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Fla., which he used in part to double down on Harris’ lack of interactions with the press. 

White House spokesman blasts Israeli official for criticizing cease-fire statement

White House national security spokesman John Kirby had strong words Friday in response to an Israeli official who criticized a joint statement by the United States, Qatar and Egypt urging Israel and Hamas to resume negotiations toward a cease-fire and hostage release.

Far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich urged Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “not to fall into this trap and not to agree to a shift, even the slightest, from the red lines,” according to a translation of his statement.

Smotrich accused the nations trying to broker an agreement of setting a “distorted and dangerous starting point.” 

Among his grievances, Smotrich complained about a proposed exchange of hostages being held in the Gaza Strip for Palestinian prisoners being held in Israel. He said the plan creates an “illusory symmetry between the Israeli abductees — men, women and children — who were abducted from their beds with terrible cruelty, and despicable terrorists who murdered Jews.”

Smotrich blasted "intermediaries" who he believes are pushing for a “surrender agreement that will drain the … blood we shed in the most just war we are waging.”

In a call with reporters, Kirby said public statements like Smotrich’s are “jeopardizing the lives of the hostages and running counter Israel's own national security interests.”

Kirby disputed Smotrich’s claim that the deal would amount to an Israeli surrender and the Israeli official’s argument that hostages should not be exchanged for prisoners. 

“Mr. Smotrich essentially suggests that the war ought to go on indefinitely without pause and with the lives of the hostages of no real concern at all,” the White House spokesman said.

“His arguments are dead wrong," Kirby said. "They're misleading the Israeli public.”

Kirby noted that the agreement was negotiated over months. He said it “fully protects Israel's national security interests” and that Israeli forces would not withdraw entirely from Gaza during the first of three proposed phases.

“Suggestions that prisoners should never be traded for hostages and that doing so at this stage is somehow a surrender — let me remind you that most of Hamas' top leaders are now dead,” Kirby said. “Hamas’ organized military structure and capacity has been destroyed. Israel has now completed nearly all of its major military objectives other than the explicit war aim of bringing the hostages home.”