Former President Donald Trump and his allies tried to energize the state’s most reliable Republican voters with a fiery pep rally Wednesday in Gwinnett County and a “faith” town hall in Middle Georgia that both aimed squarely at his party’s base.
The back-to-back events in Zebulon and Duluth reflected his campaign’s strategy to turn out as many conservative Georgians as possible, particularly younger males who don’t regularly vote in presidential races, instead of trying to win over more moderate voters.
On stage at Gas South Arena, a pyrotechnic display fired up the crowd as country music star Jason Aldean introduced the Republican nominee. Within minutes, he laced into Vice President Kamala Harris in unsparing terms, saying she is “seriously not a smart person” and describing her allies as “stupid people.”
She’s the “worst vice president in the history of the country,” he said to the thousands of cheering supporters who crowded the venue, which the campaign described as his largest event yet in Georgia. Later, clips of hardened Marines in the film “Full Metal Jacket” played, juxtaposed against footage of drag performers labeled as “THE BIDEN HARRIS MILITARY.”
A string of speakers who took the stage ahead of Trump echoed that approach. Some of the loudest ovations went to former Fox News anchor Tucker Carlson, who painted Trump as a hypermasculine hero ready to restore order.
“There has to be a point at which Dad comes home,” Carlson said, adding: “You know what he says? ‘You’ve been a bad little girl, and you’re getting a vigorous spanking right now.’ ”
Carlson, a member of Trump’s inner circle, went on to describe Democrats as the “party of weak men and unhappy women.”
It was Trump’s second rally in the span of eight days in metro Atlanta, demonstrating another strategic shift for the Republican’s campaign.
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Instead of holding events in GOP strongholds in more rural parts of Georgia, as he’s done in his two previous campaigns, Trump has scheduled his recent rallies in vote-rich metro Atlanta. Even so, many of the attendees drove hours to show their support.
“I’m not hiring him to be my priest,” said Anne Taylor, who trekked from the North Georgia mountains after casting an early vote for Trump. “I’ll take a mean tweet any day. I’m hopeful because I have so little hope in our country if he doesn’t win.”
Trump’s rally came hours after Harris accused the Republican of being “increasingly unhinged and unstable,” part of her ongoing effort to mobilize Democrats and reach middle-of-the-road voters by painting her opponent as unfit for the White House.
The Democratic nominee’s remarks, made outside her official residence in Washington, came after Trump’s longest-serving top aide, John Kelly, told two media outlets that the former president met the definition of a “fascist” and made admiring remarks about Adolf Hitler’s generals.
Credit: NYT
Credit: NYT
Harris said the remarks are a “window into who Donald Trump really is.” And she called it “deeply troubling and incredibly dangerous that Trump would invoke Hitler — the man who is responsible for the deaths of 6 million Jews and hundreds of thousands of Americans.”
A Trump spokesman called Kelly’s comments one of several “debunked stories” about his stint as the then-president’s chief of staff. And Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a former presidential contender who could hold a key position in a second Trump administration, called Kelly a member of the “deep state” to cheering attendees.
Harris, who held a rally Saturday in Atlanta with R&B star Usher, is returning to Georgia on Thursday for her first joint rally of the campaign with former President Barack Obama. It will be held in nearby Clarkston and feature a concert by rock legend Bruce Springsteen.
The rally and concert reflects Harris’ efforts to appeal to Black voters who form the bedrock of the party’s base and swing Georgians — particularly GOP-leaning women — who helped decide the state’s past few elections.
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
At Trump’s Duluth rally, his remarks veered from familiar talking points to meandering observations to the delight of attendees who spent hours waiting for him in the packed arena.
At one point, Trump mused about whether he should mimic Richard Nixon by recording his White House conversations before dismissing the idea with a laugh. Moments later, he drew cheers from the crowd when he talked about how corporate chieftains work to curry his favor.
“I was on the phone with a very important person that every person in this room will know,” he boasted, before referring to his running mate, U.S. Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, as a football executive might talk about a prized recruit.
“We drafted a great athlete,” he said.
When he returned to his prepared remarks, Trump hammered Harris over her immigration policies, painting a bleak picture of migrants covered with swastika tattoos freely crossing the U.S. border.
“The United States is now an occupied country,” he said.
The arena was bedecked with digital messages that urged supporters to “GO VOTE NOW,” a reminder of the stark shift in Republican messaging on early voting. Long a critic of early voting, which he falsely tied to widespread voting fraud in 2020, Trump now has a different stance.
“Whichever way, just get out and vote,” he said.
More than 2 million Georgians have already cast their ballots, and Republicans are optimistic that the party’s recent focus on early voting will pay dividends. Democrats, too, are enthusiastic about rising participation rates in left-leaning counties.
Trump nodded to the surging turnout for the Zebulon town hall, where an overflow crowd crammed into Christ Chapel — and thousands more waited outside in the heat. As he does at most stops, he said Nov. 5 would be remembered as the most important day in U.S. history.
There, he told the crowd what would bring success at the polls. “The way to win,” he said, “is to swamp them.”
