(AFP) – Donald Trump was set to hold a rally in the US swing state of Wisconsin on Saturday while Democrat Kamala Harris hunkered down in another crucial battleground, Pennsylvania, preparing for next week’s televised presidential debate. Trump and Harris are essentially tied in the polls, with the Republican again shrugging off a mountain of scandals that would have sunk candidates of the past. In an early-afternoon rally in Mosinee, Wisconsin, he was expected to attack Vice President Harris on the state of the US economy. While it is generally robust, with record stock markets and steady employment, polls show voters remain gloomy about inflation — with many buying Trump’s message that he would be the stronger economic leader.
The former president got a boost Friday when the country’s largest police union, the Fraternal Order of Police, endorsed him despite his multiple legal woes and historic status as a convicted felon. The endorsement came as Trump enjoyed a legal victory when a New York judge delayed his sentencing in a hush money trial until after the November election. Trump was found guilty in May of attempting to conceal a $130,000 payment to an adult movie star — just weeks before the 2016 election. On his busy Friday, the former president also had to attend a federal court hearing in New York related to a case in which he was found liable for sexually assaulting and demeaning the writer E. Jean Carroll.
And in an unusual “press conference” Friday — he took no questions — Trump railed against the women who have accused him of sexual impropriety. His focus on past charges by women came as advisors urge him instead to concentrate on the current campaign, and as polls show that voters, especially women, favor Harris by a wide margin on the issue of abortion. Trump claims credit for appointing the conservative Supreme Court justices who helped eliminate federal abortion rights, though his current stance has been described as muddled.
Harris, a former California prosecutor, is leaning heavily on her message that she represents law and order in a contest against a convicted criminal who tried to overturn his loss to President Joe Biden in 2020 – another unprecedented element in an election season that has the country on edge. The vice president jumped into the 2024 race at the last minute after Biden abruptly dropped out on July 21, amid fears over his stamina and mental acuity. Despite a burst of initial enthusiasm from Democrats, Harris has had to race to introduce and define herself.
The debate on Tuesday offers her a prime opportunity to present clear policy proposals — she has been criticized for a lack of detail — while sharpening her attack lines against Trump. Harris is spending this weekend in debate preparation in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. That state is closely divided between Republican and Democratic voters and may be the deciding piece in the puzzle of the state-by-state Electoral College battle that decides US presidential elections. The debate will be the first-ever meeting between Harris and Trump. He refused to attend Biden’s inauguration — he would have met her there — after falsely claiming he was cheated in the 2020 election.
© 2024 AFP
