Politics
Two closing arguments show the stark choice between Trump and Harris
NEW YORK (AP) — In the shadow of the White House, seven days before the final votes of the 2024 election are cast, Kamala Harris vowed to put country over party and warned that Donald Trump is obsessed with revenge and his own personal interests. Appearing before an overflowing crowd near the White House one
NEW YORK (AP) — In the shadow of the White House, seven days before the final votes of the 2024 election are cast, Kamala Harris vowed to put country over party and warned that Donald Trump is obsessed with revenge and his own personal interests.
Appearing before an overflowing crowd near the White House one week ahead of election day, Kamala Harris issued her closing argument to voters, urging them to reject Donald Trump’s efforts to sow division and fear, declaring, “That is not who we are.”
Less than 48 hours earlier inside Madison Square GardenTrump called his Democratic opponent “a trainwreck who has destroyed everything in her path.” His allies on stage labeled Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage” and made a baseless claim that Harris, a former prosecutor and senator who is trying to become the first woman to be elected president, had begun her career as a prostitute.
Donald Trump took the stage Sunday night at New York’s Madison Square Garden to deliver his campaign’s closing argument with the election nine days away after several of his allies used crude and racist insults toward Vice President Kamala Harris and other critics of the former president.
Two nights and 200 miles apart, the dueling closing arguments outlined in stark terms the choice U.S. voters face on Nov. 5 when they will weigh two very different visions of leadership and America’s future.
Trump’s raucous rally, marked by crude and racist insults, highlighted the uglier elements of his coalition. But other parts of it underscored the former businessman’s appeal as someone who vows to fix the economy and the border, and as a political outsider eager to defy any and all conventions despite the risks.
Harris, the vice president for the last four years, chose a more formal setting — the grassy Ellipse near the White House — to underscore the seriousness of this moment in American history and the threat Trump poses to democracy. She faced a massive audience in the same place where Trump addressed thousands of his loyalists on Jan. 6, 2021, before they stormed the U.S. Capitol in one of the darkest days of modern history.
But more than simply reminding voters of the danger that Trump poses to U.S. democracy, Harris’ remarks were designed to highlight her opponent’s record of prioritizing his personal interests instead of the nation’s.
“Donald Trump has spent a decade trying to keep the American people divided and afraid of each other. That’s who he is. But America, I am here tonight to say: That’s not who we are,” Harris said. “I pledge to be a president for all Americans — to always put country above party and above self.”
Senior adviser Jen O’Malley Dillon noted that Harris’ closing argument is designed to reach the narrow slice of undecided voters; many moderate Republicans are among them.
“We know that there are still a lot of voters out there that are still trying to decide who to support — or whether to vote at all,” O’Malley Dillon said. “And this race is extremely close. We talk about it as a margin of error race. We know it is going to be closed out in this final week.”
Trump’s team is more focused on energizing his partisan base and reaching infrequent voters across the political spectrum who are frustrated by the direction of the country and looking for change.
Still, Trump framed his comments in recent days with a simple question that cuts across political lines, asking voters whether they are better off now than they were four years ago at the end of his first term. While the nation was still in the throes of the pandemic when Trump left office, polls indicate that most voters are unhappy with the direction of the country today.
Trump has vowed to stage the largest deportation operation in U.S. history and impose broad tariffs to generate revenue and boost American manufacturing.
Ever defiant facing criticism from even some Republicans, Trump on Tuesday called his Madison Square Garden event “a lovefest” and did not address the comments of pro-Trump comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, who called Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage.” Hinchcliffe also made demeaning jokes about Black people, other Latinos, Palestinians and Jews in his routine before Trump took the stage.
“Nobody’s ever had love like that,” Trump said of the hours-long Sunday event that featured his family members and high-level surrogates and supporters including billionaire Elon Musk, TV psychologist “Dr. Phil” McGraw and former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. “It was really love for our country.”
The Republican former president on Tuesday also offered a dark assessment of Harris’ leadership. He said that she “obliterated” the nation’s borders, “decimated the middle class,” brought “bloodshed and squalor” to major cities and “unleashed war and chaos all over the world.”
“No person who has caused so much destruction and death at home and abroad should ever be allowed to be the president of the United States,” Trump told dozens of supporters who gathered at his Florida estate.
Trump senior adviser Jason Miller said Trump has made clear his plans to fix the economy, secure the southern border and “improve people’s daily lives.”
“Kamala Harris hasn’t done any of that,” he said. “It’s a message of despair, personal attacks and nothing from Harris or her campaign about what they’re actually going to do to help Americans. So it’s a massive contrast.”
Harris has largely moved on from the “joyful” campaigning style that defined her entrance into the presidential contest this summer. She pledged unity on Tuesday night, but she also cast Trump as someone driven more by revenge and grievance than a commitment to the people.
“This is someone who is unstable, obsessed with revenge, consumed with grievance and out for unchecked power,” Harris said. “This is not a candidate for president who is thinking about how to make your life better.”
She spoke directly to Republican voters at times and promised to listen to those who didn’t vote for her if elected. Harris previously said she would include a Republican in her Cabinet.
“Unlike Donald Trump, I don’t believe people who disagree with me are the enemy,” she said. “He wants to put them in jail. I’ll give them a seat at the table.”
Heading into the speech, the Democrat’s campaign was aware of criticism from her party’s far-left base that she has been too focused on courting moderate Republican voters. They urged Harris to focus more on working-class priorities than the threat Trump poses to U.S. democracy.
Ultimately, the vice president’s speech was designed to tie both issues together. She warned of Trump threatening democratic norms and vowed to take action against high grocery prices and help first-time home buyers with making a down payment.
Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, a top Harris ally, said voters can “walk and chew gum at the same time — meaning they can hear an argument about freedom and about something that affects their pocketbook. And I think she is certainly capable to prosecute both cases at the same time.”
Sisters Michelle Detwiler and Renee Newell drove from Virginia to attend Harris’ remarks at the Ellipse.
“We both have daughters and we’re both here for them,” Newell said. Detwiler said the location of the event is a “great counterpoint to the imagery of Jan. 6. D.C. is a great city for peaceful public gatherings.
“We’re so glad to be here and to experience the joy,” she said.
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Associated Press writers Zeke Miller and Fatima Hussein in Washington and Jill Colvin in New York contributed.
WASILLA, Alaska — Three weeks out from Election Day, President Donald Trump took a helicopter to a plane to another helicopter to a motorcade to an ice hockey rink in Alaska’s Matanuska-Susitna Valley, traversing nearly 4,000 miles over more than eight hours to turn out his base here to help Republicans defend the Senate.
But Trump’s trek might not be enough to save Sen. Dan Sullivan, who’s running in a tougher-than-expected race against Democrat Mary Peltola in a state where the president’s approval rating is underwater and independents outnumber both Republicans and Democrats.
Alaska strategists and voters who spoke to Blue Light News acknowledged that Sullivan faces a difficult path to reelection, despite Trump’s time investment and the outside money pouring in.
“Very conservative MAGA voters can’t vote for you harder,” said Scott Kendall, a veteran political strategist who worked on two of Alaska GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s campaigns and was chief of staff to former Alaska Gov. Bill Walker. “Donald Trump’s support in this current climate is both a blessing and a curse.”
Even some Trump supporters at the Tuesday night rally admitted the outlook appeared bleak.
“I think Alaska’s turning blue,” said Matt Niessink, a 45-year-old general contractor from Wasilla. He said he had voted for Trump three times and planned to support Republicans this year.
What did he wish the president would do differently? “I wish he’d shut his mouth sometimes and not be such a pompous ass,” Niessink said.
The president was in Wasilla — population 10,556 — because the outlook is darkening for his party in a state he carried by 13 points just two years ago. In a midterm year defined by the cost of gas and groceries, the Last Frontier has been hit particularly hard, with the average price of diesel nearing $7 per gallon. In the Senate race, Peltola is flush with cash and leads Sullivan in most polls. MAGA Inc., the cash-rich Trump-aligned super PAC, is increasingly focusing on Alaska as one in a slate of states that can help Republicans hold the Senate.
Enter Trump, who has been spending the cycle’s crucial final weeks holding rallies in red states to juice support among his base, which tends to see depressed turnout in years when he’s not on the ballot.
“That was a lot of flying,” the president said at the top of his remarks. “In fact, they were thinking about canceling. They said, ‘Sir, you’re very busy, this is very tough.’” But, Trump continued, he refused to cancel for a state he won three times.
Echoing his comments at other red-state rallies, Trump asked the roaring crowd for “one big favor” — to “pretend that I’m on the ballot, because every time I’ve been on the ballot, we win.” He repeated his promise that Americans will receive $5,000 dividends if Republicans hold both chambers.
“What this is about is getting out the vote,” Sullivan told reporters before Trump’s speech. “A rising tide of enthusiasm lifts all the candidates.”
Unlike some other Republican candidates in tight races, Sullivan has shied away from distancing himself from the least popular aspects of Trump’s presidency.
Sullivan proclaimed on stage at the rally that “the conflict in the Middle East is temporary. The true forever war is the national Democrats’ war against Alaska oil and gas and our jobs.” And although a campaign aide released a statement condemning Trump’s move to import Russian diesel, Sullivan did not join four of his Republican Senate colleagues, including Murkowski, who called on Trump to reverse the decision.
Art Hackney, a veteran Republican strategist in Alaska, said that “most of the people who support” Sullivan “think that he should” break more with the president.
Hackney, who runs a pro-Sullivan super PAC called “We Stand with Dan,” attributed that choice to loyalty — but suggested the president’s demand of fealty, and treatment of frequent dissenter Murkowski, could also be part of Sullivan’s calculus.
“A lot of his longtime supporters and the people who are in the industries that would benefit from that wish he would be more blunt,” Hackney said. “But with what Murkowski has done, if Dan did something considered a disrespectful trigger or something, what do you think would happen? It could well have implications for things that affect Alaska’s economy.”
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Some top congressional Republicans have privately concluded that it is likely impossible for them to keep control of the House of Representatives in the midterm elections, and they are now focused on limiting the scale of the defeat and salvaging the party’s Senate majority.
Five senior Republican lawmakers, all granted anonymity to speak candidly about their party’s dire position, told Blue Light News the House had all but slipped away.
One senior House Republican said the GOP’s goal at this point was to “save as many Republican seats as we can.” The president, this person said, was not helping.
“President Trump has made this election all about himself,” the lawmaker said. “Now we have to survive that political storm.”
A second Republican member of Congress said the movement of campaign advertising made plain which side was in control of the midterms. This lawmaker predicted Democrats would pick up about 10 seats, more than enough to take control of the chamber.
Even in newly redistricted red states like Florida and Texas, this person said, Republican candidates were “hanging on with their fingernails.”
Republicans have already fallen back from several contested House districts that they feel are no longer winnable, including those held by Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks of Iowa and Tom Kean Jr. of New Jersey. Trump carried their districts just two years ago. The party last week gave up on an Omaha-based district held by retiring Rep. Don Bacon.
Trump officials and other top GOP operatives say more candidates may be cut off in the coming days, in order to shift advertising money to races where it can make more of a difference. Republican groups have already given up on multiple races where they once hoped to unseat Democratic lawmakers.
The Republican Party is under extreme pressure across the Midwest, where it is now spending heavily to defend Senate seats in once-reliably MAGA states like Iowa, Nebraska and Kansas.
Bacon, a maverick often at odds with the White House, said there was no mystery in his party’s political tribulations.
“I’ve talked to some who are making these decisions: The biggest problem is the president’s polling numbers and unfavorables,” Bacon said.
White House officials insist they’re not giving up on either chamber of Congress. In a statement, White House spokeswoman Liz Huston said Trump remained “committed to maintaining Republican majorities in both the House and Senate.”
As he departed on Tuesday to campaign in Alaska for embattled GOP Sen. Dan Sullivan, Trump professed optimism about the midterms but acknowledged that sitting presidents typically see their party lose seats in the off year.
“But I’m doing a tour right now and I’m doing rallies,” Trump added. “The level of enthusiasm for the Republican Party is way up.”
House Speaker Mike Johnson went even further, flatly declaring during a campaign stop in deep-red Texas that “the polling is wrong” in showing his party on the brink of a broad defeat.
Yet at a tactical level, the Republican Party’s moves to shift money away from defending the House and toward saving the Senate are clear enough. In recent days, the Congressional Leadership Fund, the top super PAC for House Republicans, canceled advertising for key House candidates in Nebraska and Iowa and allowed the Senate Leadership Fund – a Republican group focused on the upper chamber – to swoop in and claim the airtime to support Nebraska Sen. Pete Ricketts and Rep. Ashley Hinson, who is running for Senate in Iowa.
“These are not the moves of a party that’s going to keep the House,” a third Republican lawmaker said.
In statements to Blue Light News, both CLF and the National Republican Congressional Committee said they had no intention of giving up on the fight for control of the House.
NRCC spokesperson Mike Marinella said districts are won “one by one,” and that the GOP has “the financial firepower and ground game needed to win.”
Chris Winkelman, president of CLF, said his group would keep moving money around to maximize the impact nationally.
The goal, he said, was to “keep the pressure on the most vulnerable Democrats and preserve a path to 218 seats.”
Former Rep. Carlos Curbelo, a Florida Republican who lost his swing seat in Trump’s first midterm election eight years ago, said his former colleagues were clear-eyed about where the election seemed to be headed.
“The environment is about as tough as one could expect,” Curbelo said. “There is no one who has privately stated that they believe Republicans can hold the House — not in recent weeks, anyway.”
Megan Messerly, Lauren Fedor, Lisa Kashinsky and Myah Ward contributed to this report.
Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff said Tuesday he will not run for president in 2028 and committed to serving a full six-year Senate term if reelected.
“I have zero interest in running for president. I’m not running for president. I’m running for reelection to the Senate,” Ossoff said during a Georgia Senate debate against Republican Rep. Mike Collins.
Asked by Greg Bluestein of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution whether he would serve his full term if he wins in November, Ossoff replied: “Yes, I will.”
The remarks are Ossoff’s most forceful rejection yet of a potential 2028 presidential bid even as his name has repeatedly surfaced in national Democrats’ conversations about possible contenders for the party’s nomination. His public commitment to a full Senate term on Tuesday is the latest of his campaign’s many efforts to tamp down that speculation.
Ossoff gained national attention this year given his strong fundraising numbers, his consistent lead in public polling against Collins and his ability to generate viral moments on the campaign trail, particularly through his attacks on President Donald Trump. Democrats are bullish about Ossoff’s ability to hold onto his Senate seat — so much so that the Democratic-aligned Senate Majority PAC said Tuesday it was removing its ad spending in Georgia for the week.
He’s also taken steps to boost the state Democratic party in Georgia, a perennial battleground that has been and will be key to winning the presidency. If November brings historic wins up and down the ballot, Ossoff will get some of the credit — and he’ll have confirmed his status as a leader in the swing state.
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