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After joining the Senate last year, JD Vance became one of the most outspoken lawmakers about the decline in U.S. fertility. The issue has long been on Vance’s mind. In an interview in April with The Wall Street Journal, Vance described low fertility as having many causes, no simple remedy and negative consequences beyond simply a smaller workforce and less sustainable programs such as Social Security. (Ip and Adamy, 7/29)

After locking up the support to be the Democratic nominee, Kamala Harris’s campaign launched a blitz of abortion-related campaign activities Monday, including events hosted by second gentleman Doug Emhoff and advocates. The campaign also released a video with the vice president condemning a new abortion law in Iowa, hoping to energize women and independent voters with her promise to protect abortion rights. (Lucey, Kusisto and Salama, 7/29)

Kamala Harris jumped into the presidential race with a broad pledge to “restore reproductive freedom.” The Harris campaign specified Monday that she’s calling for restoring Roe v. Wade. While many abortion-rights groups are championing her bid for the White House, some activists are frustrated with her position on the issue and plan to keep pushing to go further than President Joe Biden. (Messerly and Ollstein, 7/29)

The Kremlin is turning to unwitting Americans and commercial public relations firms in Russia to spread disinformation about the U.S. presidential race, top intelligence officials said Monday, detailing the latest efforts by America’s adversaries to shape public opinion ahead of the 2024 election. The warning comes after a tumultuous few weeks in U.S. politics that have forced Russia, Iran and China to revise some of the details of their propaganda playbook. What hasn’t changed, intelligence officials said, is the determination of these nations to seed the internet with false and incendiary claims about American democracy to undermine faith in the election. (Klepper, 7/29)

The gunman who tried to assassinate Donald Trump began making dozens of gun-related purchases and stocking up on bomb-making materials more than a year ago, FBI officials said Monday, the strongest indication yet that he had been planning an attack well before he opened fire on the former president. Thomas Matthew Crooks made 25 different gun-related buys online between spring 2023 and the first half of this year, and bought material used in explosives six times, officials said, offering new glimpses into their far-ranging investigation into the July 13 shooting at a campaign rally in western Pennsylvania. Crooks made the purchases online using an alias. (Gurman and Barber, 7/29)