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ST. LOUIS — Donald Trump has nothing to lose. But what does he have to gain?

Never in the modern era has any candidate entered a consequential debate in such a degraded position: Trump isn’t merely facing an uphill climb (as John McCain did in 2008) or the widespread perception he’s not up to the job (Gerald Ford in 1976) or even that he was too unlikeable to get elected (Richard Nixon in 1960). No, he’s having to grapple with all of these problems at once while cloaked in disgrace and coping with an unprecedented defection of more than two dozen Republican former supporters who feel that endorsing him has become a moral transgression.

And still, even as senior Republican leaders muse about the possibility of replacing the third-party-type invader who took over their floundering party, hints of what might have been: He’s down just 4 percentage points in many national polls.

And Sunday saw the last round of polls taken before the release of Trump’s gross and grossly offensive 2005 sex-talk tape. They weren’t great for him — CBS had him down by 4 points in Ohio and Wisconsin — but those would have been surmountable deficits had he not faced his Friday catastrophe.

Things might change, but the “Trump could still turn it around” caveat is now nothing but yadda-yadda-yadda: Even an exceptional performance at the debate here tonight might not be enough to make a big difference. But, hey, this is Donald Trump, so it’s going to be must-see-TV.

Court strikes down North Carolina voter ID law

By JOSH GERSTEIN

A federal appeals court has struck down North Carolina’s voter identification law, holding that it was “passed with racially discriminatory intent.”

The ruling also invalidated changes the state made in 2013 to early voting, same-day registration, out-of-precinct voting, and preregistration.

The three judges assigned to the case — all Democratic appointees — were unanimous that the North Carolina legislature violated the U.S. Constitution and the Voting Rights Act three years ago by passing the law requiring voters to show certain types of photo ID at the polls.

“The record makes clear that the historical origin of the challenged provisions in this statute is not the innocuous back-and-forth of routine partisan struggle that the State suggests and that the district court accepted,” Judge DIana Motz wrote on behalf of Judges James Wynn and Henry Floyd. “Rather, the General Assembly enacted them in the immediate aftermath of unprecedented African American voter participation in a state with a troubled racial history and racially polarized voting. The district court clearly erred in ignoring or dismissing this historical background evidence, all of which supports a finding of discriminatory intent.”

Are you safer than you were 8 years ago?

Donald Trump created a day at the Republican National Convention with the theme “Make America Safe Again,” where speakers hammered away at President Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton for policies Republicans claim had endangered the nation.