Former President Donald Trump has held a rally in deep-blue California, a part of an unorthodox marketing campaign transfer within the remaining stretch of the neck-and-neck United States presidential race.
The Saturday evening occasion close to the Coachella Valley — finest recognized for its annual music pageant — got here simply 22 days forward of the November 5 vote.
The ultimate stretch of the election is usually reserved for mad-dash visits to essentially the most aggressive battleground states, which embody Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona and Nevada this yr.
That makes Trump’s cease in California — a Democratic stronghold all however assured to vote overwhelmingly for Vice President Kamala Harris — atypical. Born and raised within the state, Harris beforehand served as California’s legal professional common and the district legal professional of San Francisco and stays extensively well-liked there.
Within the final presidential election, in 2020, Trump misplaced in California to Democrat Joe Biden by almost 30 proportion factors.
Talking on the rally, Trump stated: “The unconventional left Democrats have destroyed this state, however we’re going to reserve it, and we’re going to make it higher than ever.”
“You positively had any person right here that was horrible, Kamala,” he continued. “And now she desires to destroy our nation.”
The previous president then launched into a well-known stump speech that centered on deceptive claims associated to migrant crime within the US.
Trump known as migration the number-one difficulty of the election, regardless of polls exhibiting the economic system looms largest for many voters.
Why go to California?
The go to to the state has extensively been seen as an effort to shore up wider Republican assist. That’s significantly wanted in six key races for the Home of Representatives in California.
Management of each the Home and the Senate — the 2 chambers of the US Congress — is up for grabs this election season. And sure congressional districts in California are tightly cut up between Republicans and Democrats.
A victory within the six aggressive Home races may assist Republicans retain their maintain over the decrease chamber.
Going to California offers Trump the “potential to swoop in and leverage this huge inhabitants of Trump supporters”, Tim Lineberger, who was communications director for Trump’s 2016 marketing campaign in Michigan and labored within the former president’s administrations, instructed the Related Press information company.
He’s “coming right here and activating that”, Lineberger added.
The transfer can also be an effort to spice up Trump’s remaining vote depend. Within the US, the victor within the presidential race is set by the Electoral Faculty, a weighted voting system during which states award electors to the candidates based mostly on the state-level vote.
Almost all states award all their electors in a winner-takes-all system: Even when a candidate wins by a small margin in a given state, they obtain all of the electors.
That signifies that a candidate can lose within the general well-liked vote however win within the Electoral Faculty system, as Trump did in 2016. In 2020, nonetheless, he misplaced in each measures to Biden.
Having by no means received the favored vote has remained a sore topic for the previous Republican president. California, with its inhabitants of almost 40 million, provides the likelihood to prove supporters who may not in any other case really feel it’s worthwhile to go to the polls.
“I consider Donald Trump is coming to California as a result of he desires to win not solely within the Electoral Faculty, however he desires to win the favored vote,” Jim Brulte, a former chairman of the California Republican Celebration, instructed the Related Press.
Battleground blitz
To make certain, Trump is sandwiching his California go to between a cease in Nevada on Saturday and a rally in Arizona on Sunday, two battleground states extra typical for the ultimate weeks of a presidential marketing campaign.
In Nevada, Trump attended a roundtable with Latino voters, as his marketing campaign sought to capitalise on indicators that Latino males are more and more turning away from Democrats.
For her half, Harris visited North Carolina, which was just lately devastated by Hurricane Helene. She stated her go to was “at the beginning to see how they’re doing within the wake of the hurricane”.
Harris was additionally set to advertise her plan for an “alternative economic system” and meet with Black group leaders. Trump narrowly received North Carolina in 2020, however the japanese state has been trending in direction of Democrats in some current polls, buoyed by its massive college-educated and Black inhabitants.
Earlier within the day, Harris launched the outcomes of a well being examination. It stated she has “the bodily and psychological resiliency required to efficiently execute the duties of the presidency”.
Releasing well being exams has lengthy been a norm for presidential candidates within the US, with Harris rapidly underscoring that the 78-year-old Trump has to this point not accomplished so.
“It’s clear to me that he and his crew are not looking for the American individuals to essentially see what it’s that he’s doing and whether or not or not he truly is match to do the job of being president of the US,” she instructed reporters.
Trump’s marketing campaign has maintained that the previous president “has voluntarily launched updates from his private doctor” and from the physician who handled him after an assassination try in July.
“All have concluded he’s in good and wonderful well being to be Commander in Chief,” his marketing campaign spokesman stated, whereas charging that Harris “doesn’t have the stamina” of Trump.
