Donald Trump is holding his first public campaign rally since President Joe Biden dropped out of a 2024 matchup that both major parties had spent months preparing for, leaving the former president to direct his ire toward his likely new opponent, Vice .
— CHARLOTTE, N.C. Donald Trump is holding his first public campaign rally since President Joe Biden dropped out of a 2024 matchup that both major parties had spent months preparing for, leaving the former president to direct his ire toward his likely new opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris.
Trump is expected to turn his full focus on Harris as he stops Wednesday in North Carolina, a swing state that Trump has carried in the past, but Democrats have seen as pivotal. The former president’s trip to the state shows he’s still concerned about keeping it in his column this November, even as his team reaches for wins in traditionally Democratic-leaning states like Minnesota, where Trump is set to visit Saturday.
With Biden’s abrupt departure from the presidential race and Harris edging closer and closer to officially being the Democrats’ general election pick, Trump has ramped up his criticism of the vice president, whom he’s characterized as “the same as Biden but much more radical.”
He has blamed her for what he portrays as the Biden administration’s failures, particularly on security along the U.S.-Mexico border.
Trump has also hedged on plans for an expected debate with Harris, first saying that he wanted Fox News, not ABC, to host the matchup he had originally scheduled for September with Biden. On Tuesday, Trump appeared to tweak that message again, saying on a call with reporters that he’d like to debate Harris “more than once” but not committing to appearing at the debate currently on the books and saying he’d only agreed to debate Biden twice, not Harris.
