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With just 15 days to reverse his lousy position in the polls, and amid a coronavirus resurgence that could sink his quest for a second term, Donald Trump embarked on a battle-state tour.
New daily cases of Covid-19 in the US average more than 55,000, their highest level since July, according to government figures, and are increasing in more than 40 states, including many that the Republican president must win on May 3. November.
Yet despite trailing Democratic challenger Joe Biden by double digits in nearly all national polls, all of which show a substantial deficit in approval on handling the pandemic, Trump continues to host large rallies in which few supporters they wear masks and little social distancing.
Trump was in Nevada on Sunday, attending church in Las Vegas before hosting an afternoon rally. Thousands of people were expected at campaign events in other swing states on Monday (Arizona), Tuesday (Pennsylvania) and Wednesday (North Carolina). Trump is expected to continue to prioritize hopes for economic recovery over measures to counter the pandemic, including new lockdowns.
In a weekend interview on a Wisconsin radio station, Trump was asked if rallies where most of the unmasked supporters were close together were sending the wrong message.
“I don’t think so because I’m not a big believer in closure,” he said. “If you take a look at your status, they’ve been locked up and locked up and locked up and, you know, they’ve been doing it for a long time.”
Trump won Wisconsin by less than one point in 2016, but is now by more than seven, according to FiveThirtyEight.com. At a rally in Janesville on Saturday, the president again insisted that the fight against the pandemic was being won, despite statistics from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention continually showing otherwise.
Only two states, Vermont and Missouri, have reported a decline in the average number of reported cases over the past week. Connecticut and Florida lead the nation, with increases of 50% or more. Another 27 states increased between 10% and 50%, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. More than 8.1 million cases have been confirmed in the United States, the death toll approaching 220,000.
“We are doing very well, we are doing very well,” Trump said in Wisconsin. “We are turning the corner. Amazing vaccines are coming out very soon. “
On NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday, Health Secretary Alex Azar repeated the point, pleading with the American people to “stay with us. We are so close. We are weeks away from having monoclonal antibodies for you, for safe and effective vaccines. We need to bridge that day, so please give us a little more time for your individual and responsible behavior to wash your hands, watch your distance, put on your face covers when you can’t watch the distance. “
Azar dodged questions about why the president was unable to give that advice.
Trump is targeting several states that he won in 2016 and cannot afford to lose if he wants to secure the 270 electoral college votes he needs to stay in the White House.
Polls, however, continue to suggest that he is in deep trouble. His deficit with Biden in Pennsylvania, which beat Hillary Clinton in 2016 by less than 45,000 of 6 million votes, is currently more than six points. In Arizona, he is behind about four, the margin by which he won in 2016.
Ronna McDaniel, chair of the Republican National Committee, said she did not believe the polls. “I see more excitement than I saw in 2016,” he told ABC’s This Week. “I study the data every day. We know that our voters will turn out on Election Day. They don’t trust the mail so much to vote. They are coming out in these early voting states right now. “
Trump will face Biden on Thursday in the final debate in Nashville, Tennessee, following a first meeting last month marked by interruptions and evasions from the president. A second debate was canceled after Trump contracted coronavirus and spent three days in hospital, then declined to hold the debate virtually.
The resurgence of Covid-19 is one of the problems plaguing the Trump campaign. On Sunday, Gretchen Whitmer, the Democratic governor of Michigan who was the target of a right-wing plot to kidnap and possibly kill her over the blockade measures, accused Trump of “inspiring and encouraging domestic terrorism.”
Whitmer spoke after Trump campaign surrogate Lara Trump insisted her father-in-law was simply “having fun” when he attacked Whitmer and responded to shouts of “Lock her up!” at a rally in Michigan on Saturday.
Whitmer told NBC: “It is incredibly disturbing that the President of the United States, 10 days after a plot to kidnap, try and execute me, was discovered, the President is at it again and inspiring, encouraging and inciting this kind of domestic terrorism.
“It’s wrong. It has to end. It’s dangerous not only for me and my family, but also for public servants around the world who are doing their job and trying to protect their fellow Americans. People of good will on both sides from the hallway should step up and say this and turn down the heat.
Thirteen men have been charged in connection with the plot, which included plans to storm the state capitol and hold some kind of trial.
Also on the agenda this week is the controversial nomination of right-wing Justice Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court. The Senate judicial committee is expected to move forward with her taking a seat before Election Day. Democrats have criticized the speed with which Republicans are pushing Barrett into the vacancy created by the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg. But if Republican support continues, they won’t be able to stop it.
