Former President Donald Trump rallied in Asheboro, N.C., Wednesday, delivering remarks on his foreign policy platform and criticizing the Biden-Harris administration.
The event marked Trump’s first outdoor rally since surviving a July 13 assassination attempt. Held at the North Carolina Aviation Museum & Hall of Fame, the rally boasted enhanced security measures including bulletproof glass surrounding the podium, storage containers blocking off the venue’s perimeter and snipers positioned on surrounding roofs.
Trump’s North Carolina stop comes a day before his Democratic challenger, Vice President Kamala Harris, is set to take the stage in Chicago on the fourth and final day of the Democratic National Convention. She accepted the party’s presidential nomination Tuesday in a virtual address from a campaign event in Milwaukee — where Trump accepted his nomination during the Republican National Convention a few weeks prior.
Trump is facing his most intense schedule yet this year on the campaign trail this week as he visits battleground states around the country in an effort to draw attention away from the DNC. He visited Pennsylvania Monday and Michigan Tuesday, and he is slated to appear in Arizona Friday after his Wednesday rally in North Carolina.
The Republican nominee framed his address around national security issues, repeating talking points from his platform such as claims that members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization have failed to pay “their dues.”
Trump spent much of his time criticizing the Biden-Harris administration for its foreign policy agenda over the last three and a half years. He argued that the Russia-Ukraine war would not have occurred had he been in office in 2022 and condemned the administration’s handling of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.
“Since the Afghanistan catastrophe, it’s been open season on America and their allies,” Trump said.
Trump has recently been at odds with his campaign team, who have been advocating for him to “stick to policy” in his speeches as he contends with Harris as his new opponent. The Republican nominee frequently deviated from planned remarks Wednesday to accuse the Democratic Party of “cheating in elections” and attack the character of prominent party members including Harris, former President Barack Obama and former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.
Some supporters have expressed concerns that Trump’s reliance on personal insults could hurt his chances in November.
“He needs to keep the conversation on the issues and what he’s going to do for Americans instead of running off on tangents where he’s just bashing [Harris] and that sort of thing,” said North Carolinian Kory Jeno.
Trump was joined onstage by his running mate, Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, who delivered brief opening remarks. N.C. Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, the Republican nominee for governor, also spoke at the event.
A Times/Siena poll released Aug. 17 shows Harris leading Trump 49% to 47% in North Carolina, while polling data from FiveThirtyEight has Harris just over Trump at 45.8% to 45.5% as of Wednesday.
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Zoe Kolenovsky is a Trinity junior and news editor of The Chronicle's 120th volume.