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PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) – Former President Barack Obama will make his first campaign appearance on Wednesday for Democratic candidate Joe Biden, who is locked in a tight race with President Donald Trump in crucial states with just 13 days left to run.
Obama, who has served eight years in office with Biden, will urge supporters to vote early for the former vice president and other Democratic candidates at an outdoor rally in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania’s largest city, said an Obama aide.
Americans are voting early at a record rate this year, with more than 41 million ballots cast both by mail and in person before Election Day on Nov. 3, on coronavirus concerns and to make sure they are counted. your votes.
Trump will head to North Carolina, another battleground state where opinion polls show a close race, for a rally Wednesday night.
COVID-19 ON THE RISE AGAIN
The final days of the campaign take place amid a surge in new COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations in battle states, including North Carolina and Pennsylvania, but also Wisconsin, Ohio and Michigan.
Pennsylvania has averaged 1,500 new cases a day over the past week, a level it hasn’t seen since April, according to a Reuters analysis. North Carolina has averaged 2,000 new cases per day for the past week, its highest level to date.
Polls show that most voters are disappointed in the way Trump has handled the pandemic, which he has repeatedly said would go away on its own.
In a call organized by the Biden campaign and Texas Democrats on Wednesday, several Texas Republicans urged their fellow Conservatives to vote for Biden, citing the coronavirus crisis and Biden’s character.
“This is not a decision I made lightly. I love the Republican Party and I love most of the Republican Party officials. But I love my country more, “said Jacob Monty, a Republican immigration attorney who resigned from Trump’s Hispanic national advisory council in 2016.
OBAMA IN THE CENTER OF ATTENTION
The rare public appearance of Obama, still one of the Democratic Party’s biggest stars nearly four years after leaving the White House and a frequent target of Trump’s attacks, comes at a critical moment.
Biden and Trump are scheduled to meet for their second and final debate Thursday night, giving the Republican a chance to turn the tide of a career that Biden is leading in national polls.
Biden’s campaign manager, Jen O’Malley Dillon, warned staff and supporters that she sees a much closer race in the 17 states the campaign sees as battlegrounds than national polls suggest that show it has a wide lead. .
“As President Obama has said, this is a hands-on time and he looks forward to hitting the road in person, socially distanced, as we are only two weeks away from the most important election of our lives,” said the assistant Obama, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Biden believes he must win his home state of Pennsylvania, which Democrats narrowly lost to Trump in 2016, and has visited more than any other state during the campaign.
Trump has gained ground in Pennsylvania, according to a Reuters / Ipsos poll released Monday, which showed the challenger leading between 49% and 45%, slightly narrower than a week earlier.
“If we win Pennsylvania, we win everything,” Trump said Tuesday at a rally in Erie, in the northwest corner of the state.
The early voting record so far represents about 30% of the total votes cast in 2016, according to the Electoral Project of the University of Florida in the United States.
Opinion polls and voting results indicate that many of these early voters generally do not participate in elections, but this year they are coming off the bench to endorse Biden, or vote against Trump.
Trump, who has resumed a packed schedule of protests since recovering from his recent fight with COVID-19, will appear Wednesday night at a rally at the Gastonia, North Carolina, airport.
Biden’s running mate Kamala Harris is also in North Carolina to mobilize voters in Asheville and Charlotte.
(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt in Philadelphia and Joseph Ax in New York; additional reporting by John Whitesides in Washington and Lisa Shumaker in Chicago; written by Sonya Hepinstall; edited by Scott Malone and Jonathan Oatis)
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