عربي English Türkçe اردو فارسى
Logo
Latest News
World

Trump Says Harris Easier Than Biden to Beat as Race for Pennsylvania Heats Up

FILE PHOTO: US Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris and her running mate Minnesota Governor Tim Walz greet the crowd during a campaign event in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, US, August 7, 2024. REUTERS/Erica Dischino/File Photo/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: US Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris and her running mate Minnesota Governor Tim Walz greet the crowd during a campaign event in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, US, August 7, 2024. REUTERS/Erica Dischino/File Photo/File Photo
TT
TT

Trump Says Harris Easier Than Biden to Beat as Race for Pennsylvania Heats Up

FILE PHOTO: US Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris and her running mate Minnesota Governor Tim Walz greet the crowd during a campaign event in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, US, August 7, 2024. REUTERS/Erica Dischino/File Photo/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: US Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris and her running mate Minnesota Governor Tim Walz greet the crowd during a campaign event in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, US, August 7, 2024. REUTERS/Erica Dischino/File Photo/File Photo

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said on Saturday he believed Democrat Kamala Harris will be easier to beat than President Joe Biden even as some polls showed her edging ahead in the race for the Nov. 5 presidential election.
Trump, the former president, spoke at a rally in Wilkes-Barre in northeastern Pennsylvania, a state looming large in the campaign. Vice President Harris will conduct a bus tour of western Pennsylvania starting in Pittsburgh on Sunday, ahead of the kickoff of the Democratic National Convention on Monday in Chicago, Reuters said.
"I believe she will be easier to beat than him," said Trump, referring to her as "radical" and a "lunatic."
Trump has sought to portray Harris as far left on a number of policies. At the rally, he highlighted her previous call for a ban on fracking, an industry important to the state. Harris' campaign has recently indicated she would not support a ban.
He also continued to attack Harris on personal terms, even as some political analysts say such comments could hurt Trump with moderate voters.
"Have you heard her laugh? That is the laugh of a crazy person," Trump said, adding that he was displeased by the illustration of Harris on the cover of the latest issue of Time magazine. "I'm much better looking than her."
In a meandering speech, Trump repeated his false claim that he lost the 2020 election due to fraud, dismissed the threat of climate change and said his plan to impose across-the-board tariffs on foreign goods would not act as a tax on US consumers, an assertion that most economists contest.
The Mohegan Sun Arena, where Trump appeared, has a capacity of roughly 8,000 and was nearly full when he started speaking. But the crowd began to thin after the one-hour mark. He spoke for more than 100 minutes in total.
Trump said Harris should have done more to tackle inflation and other issues since she and Biden took office. If reelected he said he would sign an executive order directing cabinet secretaries and agency heads to take action to lower prices.
"Another rally, same old show," Joseph Costello, a spokesperson for the Harris campaign, said in a statement responding to Trump's rally speech, which he described as filled with "lies, name-calling, and confused rants."
Pennsylvania was one of three Rust Belt states, along with Wisconsin and Michigan, that helped power Trump's upset victory in 2016. Biden, who grew up in Scranton, Pennsylvania, flipped the trio back to the Democrats in 2020.
With 19 electoral votes out of the 270 needed to secure the White House, compared with 15 in Michigan and 10 in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania may be the biggest prize in this year's election and potentially tip the balance for either candidate.
Harris' entry into the race after Biden ended his reelection bid last month has upended the contest, erasing the lead Trump built in the final weeks of Biden's campaign. Harris is leading Trump by more than two percentage points in Pennsylvania, according to the poll tracking website FiveThirtyEight.
BLANKETING AIRWAVES WITH ADS
Trump won Pennsylvania in 2016 by about 44,000 votes, a margin of less than one percentage point, while Biden prevailed by just over 80,000 votes in 2020, a 1.2-point margin.
Both campaigns have made the state a top priority, blanketing the airwaves with advertisements. Of the more than $110 million spent on advertising in seven battleground states since Biden dropped out in late July, roughly $42 million was in Pennsylvania, more than twice any other state, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, citing data from the tracking site AdImpact.
Democratic and Republican groups have already reserved $114 million in ad time in Pennsylvania from late August through the election, more than twice as much as the $55 million reserved in Arizona, the next highest total, according to AdImpact.
The Harris campaign said on Saturday it planned to spend at least $370 million on digital and television ads nationwide between the Labor Day holiday on Sept. 2 and Election Day.
The battleground states - seen as critical for winning the election - also include Arizona, North Carolina, Nevada and Georgia.
New polls published on Saturday by the New York Times found Harris leading Trump among likely voters in Arizona, 50% to 45%, and in North Carolina, 49% to 47%, and narrowing the former president's leads in Nevada, 47% to 49%, and in Georgia, 46% to 50%. A pollster from the Trump campaign said the poll results underestimated the Republican candidate's support.
Trump will give remarks 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 that day as well.
Trump's trip to Wilkes-Barre in Luzerne County was aimed at solidifying support among the white, non-college-educated voters who lifted him to victory in 2016. The blue-collar county voted Democratic for decades before swinging heavily toward Trump in 2016, mirroring other similar regions around the country.
Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, will make multiple stops across Allegheny and Beaver counties on Sunday, the campaign said. The tour is the first time Harris, Walz and their spouses have campaigned together since their first rally as a presidential ticket in Philadelphia earlier this month.

Most Viewed

 
 
World

Venezuelan Opposition Protests as Election Dispute Drags on

A child holds a Venezuelan flag as Venezuelan opposition supporters participate in a global protest amid Venezuela's disputed presidential election, in San Jose, Costa Rica, August 17, 2024. (Reuters)
A child holds a Venezuelan flag as Venezuelan opposition supporters participate in a global protest amid Venezuela's disputed presidential election, in San Jose, Costa Rica, August 17, 2024. (Reuters)
TT
TT

Venezuelan Opposition Protests as Election Dispute Drags on

A child holds a Venezuelan flag as Venezuelan opposition supporters participate in a global protest amid Venezuela's disputed presidential election, in San Jose, Costa Rica, August 17, 2024. (Reuters)
A child holds a Venezuelan flag as Venezuelan opposition supporters participate in a global protest amid Venezuela's disputed presidential election, in San Jose, Costa Rica, August 17, 2024. (Reuters)

Venezuela's political opposition and its supporters gathered in cities around the country on Saturday to demand recognition of what they say is their candidate's resounding victory in a presidential vote nearly three weeks ago.

The country's electoral authority, considered by the opposition to be an arm of the ruling party, has said President Nicolas Maduro won his third term in the July 28 contest, with just under 52% of the vote.

But the opposition, led by former lawmaker Maria Corina Machado, has published online what it says are 83% of voting machine tallies, which gave its candidate Edmundo Gonzalez a hearty 67% support.

The disputed vote has thrown the economically beleaguered nation into political crisis, and a government crackdown on protests has led to at least 2,400 arrests. Clashes connected to the protests have also led to at least 23 deaths.

The international community has offered a raft of suggestions for overcoming the nearly three-week-old election crisis - including a new vote - but most have been rejected outright by both the ruling party and opposition.

In the capital Caracas, thousands gathered in the eastern part of the city along its main thoroughfare.

Standing on a truck in the center of the crowd, Machado called for independent, international verification of the election and for her supporters to stay in the streets.

"There is nothing above the voice of the people and the people have spoken," she said.

Jesus Aguilar, a 21-year-old theology student, said he turned out to support the opposition in hope of a better future: "We know that with this government there are no possibilities for growth. I've even seen myself trying to leave the country."

In cities across the country, Venezuelans were in the streets. In Maracaibo, Venezuela's once oil-rich city in the northwest, hundreds had gathered by 9 a.m. (1300 GMT).

"We have already been through the worst, we don't have any more fear," Noraima Rodriguez, 52, told Reuters. "My daughter died because there were no medical supplies in the university hospital. I have nothing to lose, but I want a future for my grandchildren."

In the cities of Valencia, San Cristobal and Barquisimeto, hundreds demonstrated, many waving Venezuelan flags, protest signs or copies of voting tallies. In Maracay, about 110 km (70 miles) west of Caracas, about a hundred protesters were dispersed with tear gas.

From Bogota to Madrid, the Venezuelan diaspora turned out in droves. In downtown Mexico City, nearly 1,000 people gathered at the central Plaza de la Revolucion. "This is the moment for a free Venezuela," said Jesus Mata, 30, a street vendor who arrived in Mexico two years ago.

Motivated by economic and political crisis, he was among tens of thousands of Venezuelans to cross the treacherous jungle between Colombia and Panama known as the Darien Gap, notorious for robberies, kidnappings, rapes and other dangers.

"I hope for an end to 25 years of darkness, that there is freedom so that the almost 8 million Venezuelans who are outside the country can go back home," he added.

Maduro has presided over economic collapse, with a loss of over 73% of Venezuela's gross domestic product since 2013, according to researchers from the Institute of Superior Administration Studies in Caracas.

At Miraflores Palace after a march in support of the government, Maduro promised 8% growth this year and railed against international critics and the opposition.

"We have won the right to make whatever future we want in Venezuela, however we want, and no one can stick their noses in Venezuela," he told a crowd waving Venezuelan flags. "I do not go around giving advice to anybody in the world about what to do with this country or that country...the door will be slammed on anyone who pokes their nose into Venezuela."

The opposition is still pushing for recognition of its victory, but its options are narrowing as international attention moves elsewhere, opposition sources and analysts told Reuters this week.

Many Western countries have urged full publication of results, while Russia, China and others have congratulated Maduro on his victory.

Washington, which hardened oil sanctions in April on the OPEC member for what it said was Maduro's failure to comply with a deal on electoral conditions, and other Western countries are showing little sign of swift, tough action over what many of them have condemned as voting fraud.

Latin American leaders will discuss the crisis this weekend when many are in the Dominican Republic to attend the inauguration of that country's new president, Panama's president has said.