Republican Donald Trump said Saturday he believes Democrat Kamala Harris will be easier to defeat than President Joe Biden, though some polls show him ahead in the race for the November 5 presidential election.
Former President Trump made the remarks at a rally in Wilkes-Barre in the northeastern part of Pennsylvania, a big state in the campaign. Vice President Harris will take a bus tour of western Pennsylvania, starting in Pittsburgh on Sunday, ahead of the start of the Democratic National Convention on Monday in Chicago.
Trump described them as “radicals” and “crazy,” adding, “I believe they will be easier to defeat than they are.”
Trump has attempted to paint Harris as left-wing on a number of policies. At the rally, he highlighted her past call for a ban on fracking, a key industry for the state. Harris’ campaign has recently indicated she would not support a ban.
He also continued to attack Harris on a personal basis, though some political analysts say such comments could hurt Trump among moderate voters.
“Have you heard his laugh? That’s the laugh of a crazy person,” Trump said.
Pennsylvania was one of three Rust Belt states, along with Wisconsin and Michigan, that helped power Trump’s unexpected victory in 2016. Biden, who grew up in Scranton, Pennsylvania, flipped all three back to the Democrats in 2020.
With 19 of the 270 electoral votes needed to secure the White House, compared with 15 in Michigan and 10 in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania could be the biggest prize in this year’s election and potentially tip the balance for both candidates.
Harris’ entry into the race after Biden ended his re-election bid last month has upended the contest, erasing the lead Trump built during the final weeks of Biden’s shaky campaign. Harris is leading Trump by more than 2 percentage points in Pennsylvania, according to poll tracking website Five Thirty Eight.
Lots of advertisements in the air
Trump won Pennsylvania by about 44,000 votes in 2016, a margin of less than one percent, while Biden won by about 80,000 votes in 2020, a difference of 1.2%.
Both campaigns have made the state a top priority, and have flooded Hawaii with advertising. More than $110 million has been spent on advertising in seven battleground states since Biden dropped out in late July, with nearly $42 million of that spent in Pennsylvania, more than twice as much as any other state, The Wall Street Journal reported Friday, citing data from tracking site AdImpact.
According to AdImpact, Democratic and Republican groups have reserved $114 million for ad time in Pennsylvania from late August until the election, more than double the $55 million reserved in Arizona, the next-highest figure.
The Harris campaign said Saturday that it plans to spend at least $370 million on digital and television ads across the country between the Labor Day holiday and Election Day on Sept. 2.
Battleground states considered crucial to winning the election also include Arizona, North Carolina, Nevada and Georgia.
New polls published by The New York Times on Saturday found Harris leading Trump among likely voters in Arizona 50% to 45% and in North Carolina 49% to 47%, and the former president’s leads have narrowed to 47% to 49% in Nevada and 46% to 50% in Georgia. A Trump campaign pollster said the survey results underestimated the Republican nominee’s support.
Trump and Harris have visited Pennsylvania more than a half-dozen times this year. On July 13, there was an assassination attempt on Trump at his rally near Butler, Pennsylvania, in which he was injured.
Trump will comment on the economy at a campaign event in York, Pennsylvania, on Monday. His running mate, US Senator JD Vance, will hold an event in Philadelphia the same day.
Trump’s visit to Wilkes-Barre in Luzerne County on Saturday is aimed at solidifying support among the white, non-college-educated voters who carried him to victory in 2016. The blue-collar county voted Democratic for decades before swinging heavily in Trump’s favor in 2016, mirroring other similar regions across the country.
Trump won Luzerne by 14.4 percentage points in 2020, a smaller margin than his 19.4-point win in 2016. With Biden out of the picture, Trump appears likely to have an advantage in this area of the state, said Chris Borick, a political science professor at Muhlenberg College.
“This is a place where Trump has a lot of strength,” Borick said, referring to the state’s northeast region. “A modest gain in an area like that could certainly have some impact on his ability to take back Pennsylvania.”
Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, will make several stops in Allegheny and Beaver counties on Sunday, according to the campaign. This is the first time Harris, Walz and their spouses are campaigning together since their first presidential rally in Philadelphia earlier this month.
Pennsylvania was central to Biden’s winning 2020 strategy in the Rust Belt states: limiting Trump’s margins among working-class white voters while building majorities among suburban voters and boosting high turnout in urban areas with large Black populations.
The Harris campaign is also employing a similar “win big, lose small” strategy, aiming to win by large margins in the cities and suburbs of Philadelphia and Pittsburgh while limiting losses in smaller counties such as Beaver County, where Trump won 58% of the vote in 2020.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
