Regardless of party, Presidential candidates have long spent the closing weeks of their campaigns singularly focused on spending as much time in battleground states as possible.
But Donald Trump has other plans in mind.
And now Kamala Harris is spooked after Donald Trump called an audible Democrats never saw coming.
A New Yorker through and through
While Florida has obviously become his home state in recent years, former President Donald Trump will always be a New Yorker through and through.
Trump even told reporters recently, “I love New York, I miss New York,” when asked about the state where he was born and built his real estate empire.
The former President’s love for New York is often not reciprocated, though, thanks to the fact that it is universally controlled by Democrats.
In the 2020 election, President Joe Biden reportedly secured 76% of the vote in New York City, while former First Lady Hillary Clinton secured 79% of the city’s vote in 2016.
For his part, Trump won just 23% and 18% of the New York City vote respectively in each of those races – hence the reason so many of Democrats’ witch hunts against him have originated in New York.
But recent polling is suggesting that Vice President Kamala Harris is performing below Biden and Clinton’s past results.
And while there’s no question that Kamala will easily win both New York City and the state, the Empire State is in the midst of roughly 7 competitive Congressional races that could be heavily impacted by the number of votes the Democrat Vice President and Trump are able to pull-in.
Essentially, if Kamala performs at the level of Biden, she could help pull Democrat Congressional candidates across the finish line, but if she underperforms while Trump improves his vote total, Republicans could very well pick up several New York seats in the U.S. House.
“The peril for Democrats in New York emerged clearly in recent polling by Siena College, which found that Harris got a 5-point boost after replacing Biden atop the ticket but hadn’t reached his 22-point winning margin of four years earlier,” Semafor reported. “Harris will have no trouble winning New York’s 28 electoral votes next month, but Democrats are hoping for big coattails to pull their House candidates to victory in swing races.”
🚨🚨 Kamala Harris is underperforming Joe Biden in 2020 in every district in NY, NY Republicans are working to win in 2024! pic.twitter.com/ZrWoYoDrrh
— Elise Stefanik (@EliseStefanik) October 8, 2024
Entering hostile territory
As such, Trump is making a last-minute move Kamala never saw coming.
According to a report from The New York Post, the former President is making good on a promise he originally made in February by hosting one of his patented rallies inside Madison Square Garden on October 29 – just nine days before Election Day.
“[I] think I’ll do one maybe at Madison Square Garden,” Trump originally told Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo back in February. “New York has changed a lot in the last two years. People that would have never voted for me because I’m a Republican, but I think they’re going to vote for me.”
Of course, this won’t be Trump’s first visit to the state of New York this election cycle – he previously held a rally at the Nassau Coliseum on Long Island last month, and another in the Bronx earlier this year.
Those New York rallies garnered 16,000 and 10,000 attendees respectively, so it’s safe to say that Trump will have no issue filling up Madison Square Garden, even if it’s in one of Democrats’ biggest strongholds.
And if the former President can make enough noise in New York in the lead up to Election Day, he could very well help swing some crucial Congressional races to Republicans.