Former President Donald J. Trump crisscrossed the battleground state of Michigan on Friday, projecting himself as an economic protectionist to blue-collar voters and speaking to Kamala Trump on immigration on the same day he visited the southern border. He attacked Vice President Harris.
Trump used two events to try to blame Harris for inflation and the immigration crisis, drawing on some of the populist themes that helped him win Michigan and the presidential race in the 2016 election. did. In 2020, the state flipped for President Biden.
In the afternoon, the former president visited a manufacturing facility near Grand Rapids before holding a town hall event in suburban Detroit, which started about 90 minutes late and ended in just 30 minutes.
At a second event in Warren, Michigan, Trump spoke about protections to limit imports from China and other countries that he says are killing jobs in the state unless Congress acts. He vowed to take steps to enforce the tariffs. .
“I love the word ‘tariff,'” he said at Macomb Community College. At the university, he was joined on stage by one of his staunchest allies in the Senate, Tennessee Sen. Marsha Blackburn, who moderated the town hall.
Mr. Trump responded to some friendly questions from his supporters and set out familiar talking points and lines of attack. He said Americans are withholding certain amenities because they can no longer afford them under the Biden-Harris administration.
“I don’t order bacon anymore,” he said. “It’s too expensive.”
Macomb County, a working-class area north of Detroit, supported Trump in 2016 and 2020. Trump’s visit to Michigan came a day after voters in the state began receiving absentee ballots.
Harris met with Border Patrol agents in Douglas, Arizona, on Friday, making her first visit to the U.S.-Mexico border since becoming a Democratic presidential candidate.
Hours earlier, at his first Michigan event in Walker, Trump spent 25 minutes criticizing the Biden administration’s immigration policies. Trump, who was convicted of 34 felonies in Manhattan and whose lies about the 2020 election led to the storming of the Capitol, called Harris’ border policy a “crime” and said it was “more than an annihilation of national sovereignty.” There was no dishonest act.” Your own country. ”
Mr. Trump has once again largely portrayed immigrants as “murderers” bent on invading the United States, but border officials say this characterization ignores that many of the migrants are families with children. He pointed to Immigration and Customs Enforcement data reported by Fox News on Friday that there are 662,566 noncitizens with criminal records on the agency’s national registry.
However, the data does not support many of Trump’s claims about immigration, including his claim that illegal immigrants are causing a spike in crime in the United States, a claim that is not supported by available domestic data. Not yet.
And at one point, Trump made some claims about immigration without evidence, including continuing to claim that other countries are intentionally sending prisoners of war and mentally ill people across the southern border. Even though he admitted it and later claimed that it wasn’t necessary.
“They’re dumping them in our country, and I had no proof,” Trump told hundreds of workers at a manufacturing company in Walker. He further added: That’s common sense. ”
Mr. Trump’s advisers have been eager to have Mr. Trump focus on policy, particularly on immigration and the economy, where polls show dissatisfaction with Democrats.
As he often does in Michigan, he singled out autoworkers and the auto industry, which have long been central to the state’s economy. He criticized Harris’ tax plan and renewed his promise to impose tariffs of more than 100 percent on all cars crossing the Mexican border, a proposal that could violate the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement negotiated by his administration. There is sex.
And as he was talking about the tax cuts he was proposing, he paused for a moment to acknowledge that people were coming home from his event before it was over, and that he wanted to make sure people didn’t leave his gatherings early. , falsely claimed, “I’ll quit right away when they leave.”
During the debate, Harris irritated Trump by suggesting that people were leaving Trump’s events early because they were bored and exhausted. On Friday, Trump told the crowd that those who left early were heading backstage to take photos. Some of them may have done so, but the crowd behind the press box had already thinned out long before he made that comment.
In a sign of Michigan’s importance, Harris issued a statement ahead of Trump’s visit, criticizing Trump for favoring businesses over workers and failing to deliver on manufacturing promises during his presidency. criticized.
Arguing that Trump’s trade deal opens the door for companies to outsource jobs to Mexico, Harris said: Once again he repeats the same strategy and tells the same lies about how he will fight for workers, including workers in Michigan. ”
Harris and Trump remain in a close race in Michigan, according to New York Times polling averages for the state. Still, Ms. Harris held a narrow lead last month, and her replacement as the Democratic nominee for Mr. Biden significantly narrowed Mr. Trump’s lead that had seemed to hold for months.
At the City Hall event, Trump sat near a prop, a 1967 Chevrolet Camaro. He was asked by one of his supporters what his favorite American car was. His answer is “Cadillac.” He said his late father, Fred Trump, would buy him a dark blue Cadillac every two years.
“I buy a lot for different clubs and stuff,” Trump said of Cadillacs, adding, “That’s a great question.”
