Donald Trump is afraid of the campaign trail, his poll numbers are cratering, the deplorable influencers are jumping ship, and his online rantings have crossed over into the hysterical ravings of a lunatic. Meanwhile, Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, are setting the campaign trail on fire.
Things are not looking great for Team MAGA.
Trump held a campaign event in Montana on Friday. Because everything that could go wrong is going wrong, his plane had a mechanical issue and was diverted to land in Billings, placing him 150 miles from his rally in Bozeman. The rally was scheduled to start at 8 PM local time, and Trump didn’t take the stage until about 9:30 PM.
This was the only rally Trump scheduled in the 11 days between Aug. 2 and Aug. 14, and Montana isn’t even a battleground state—he won it by 16 percentage points in 2020. At his Thursday press conference, a reporter asked Trump about his lack of public campaign events, saying, “Some of your allies have expressed concern that you're not taking this very seriously.”
“What a stupid question this is,” he responded. But when pressed, he added, “Because I'm leading by a lot and because I'm letting their convention go through, and I am campaigning a lot. I'm doing tremendous amounts of taping here. We have commercials that are at a level I don't think that anybody's ever done before.”
For the record, when it comes to fall ad reservations in battleground states, Democrats are spending over twice that of Republicans, so I’m not sure what he’s talking about there.
Perhaps Trump is avoiding campaigning because of his underwhelming crowd sizes? Here is Trump’s pathetic turnout in Montana, made even funnier by the desperate hype efforts from this right-wing media operation:
Here is the Harris rally in Arizona the same day:
Trump hasn’t held a rally in Arizona since June 6, which is over two months ago.
And Harris’ crowds the past few days have been similarly impressive in Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
Maybe Trump is avoiding campaigning because he’s in obvious cognitive decline. During his Montana rally, his speech was often slurred and he regularly took long, confusing pauses between thoughts. His handlers have to know that his public appearances are no doubt reminding most Americans why they don’t like him, and also just how old he is. Republicans spent a year arguing that being the oldest candidate in the field was bad—and now that’s backfired.
Furthermore, his claim at the press conference that he’s “leading by a lot” is flatly false. Just look at the latest high-quality polls from The New York Times/Siena College, where, after leading much of the year, Trump is now facing a serious deficit in the key battlegrounds of Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Harris leads all three by the same 50-46 margin among likely voters. These polls aren’t a fluke, either. In 538’s national polling average, Harris has opened up a lead of over 2 points.
It’s still a close race, and no one is pretending Harris has this in the bag, but Trump sure is pretending he has it in the bag—and it appears to be keeping him off the campaign trail.
Adding to the bad news for Trump, famous podcaster Joe Rogan appeared to endorse Robert Kennedy Jr. on Thursday,
“They gaslight you, they manipulate you, they promote narratives, and the only one who is not doing that is Robert F. Kennedy Jr.,” Rogan told his millions of young, male listeners, adding, “He's the only one that makes sense to me. He doesn't attack people. He attacks actions and ideas. But he’s much more reasonable and intelligent.”
These comments came among a swell of Trump skepticism from right-wing figures like gun-rights extremist Kyle Rittenhouse, white supremacist Nick Fuentes, and neo-Nazi Richard Spencer. And while Rogan and Rittenhouse subsequently walked back their statements after facing MAGA backlash, it betrays a lack of faith and enthusiasm from those who should be Trump’s fiercest, most excited supporters.
Whatever is keeping Trump off the campaign trail certainly isn’t keeping him off Truth Social, his Twitter clone. His latest rantings there show that he’s even more unmoored from reality.
On Saturday, he claimed Harris has agreed to three debates with him, including one on Sept. 4 on Fox News. The truth? Harris has agreed to one debate so far, on ABC News on Sept. 10.
The same day, minutes after Harris endorsed ending taxes on tips, Trump posted, “Kamala Harris, whose ‘Honeymoon’ period is ENDING, and is starting to get hammered in the Polls, just copied my NO TAXES ON TIPS Policy. The difference is, she won’t do it, she just wants it for Political Purposes!” Instead of holding his own rallies, he was apparently watching hers!
But his craziest outburst came Sunday morning, when he posted this screed:
It almost goes without saying that the crowd-size conspiracy theory was quickly debunked by numerous news outlets.
He so desperately wishes he were still running against President Joe Biden, and appears unable to comprehend that he’s getting beat by a Black woman. Meanwhile, Trump running mate JD Vance is a walking disaster creepily stalking Harris’ campaign events, speaking to crowds of dozens.
Meanwhile, the Harris-Walz campaign is nothing but good vibes.
This joy and fun is even better than Barack Obama’s hope. This is life, and Trump’s ugly darkness is losing the battle.
Help turn the good vibes into a Harris presidency with your donation today!
Things are not looking great for Team MAGA.
Trump held a campaign event in Montana on Friday. Because everything that could go wrong is going wrong, his plane had a mechanical issue and was diverted to land in Billings, placing him 150 miles from his rally in Bozeman. The rally was scheduled to start at 8 PM local time, and Trump didn’t take the stage until about 9:30 PM.
This was the only rally Trump scheduled in the 11 days between Aug. 2 and Aug. 14, and Montana isn’t even a battleground state—he won it by 16 percentage points in 2020. At his Thursday press conference, a reporter asked Trump about his lack of public campaign events, saying, “Some of your allies have expressed concern that you're not taking this very seriously.”
“What a stupid question this is,” he responded. But when pressed, he added, “Because I'm leading by a lot and because I'm letting their convention go through, and I am campaigning a lot. I'm doing tremendous amounts of taping here. We have commercials that are at a level I don't think that anybody's ever done before.”
For the record, when it comes to fall ad reservations in battleground states, Democrats are spending over twice that of Republicans, so I’m not sure what he’s talking about there.
Perhaps Trump is avoiding campaigning because of his underwhelming crowd sizes? Here is Trump’s pathetic turnout in Montana, made even funnier by the desperate hype efforts from this right-wing media operation:
Here is the Harris rally in Arizona the same day:
Trump hasn’t held a rally in Arizona since June 6, which is over two months ago.
And Harris’ crowds the past few days have been similarly impressive in Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
Maybe Trump is avoiding campaigning because he’s in obvious cognitive decline. During his Montana rally, his speech was often slurred and he regularly took long, confusing pauses between thoughts. His handlers have to know that his public appearances are no doubt reminding most Americans why they don’t like him, and also just how old he is. Republicans spent a year arguing that being the oldest candidate in the field was bad—and now that’s backfired.
Furthermore, his claim at the press conference that he’s “leading by a lot” is flatly false. Just look at the latest high-quality polls from The New York Times/Siena College, where, after leading much of the year, Trump is now facing a serious deficit in the key battlegrounds of Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Harris leads all three by the same 50-46 margin among likely voters. These polls aren’t a fluke, either. In 538’s national polling average, Harris has opened up a lead of over 2 points.
It’s still a close race, and no one is pretending Harris has this in the bag, but Trump sure is pretending he has it in the bag—and it appears to be keeping him off the campaign trail.
Adding to the bad news for Trump, famous podcaster Joe Rogan appeared to endorse Robert Kennedy Jr. on Thursday,
“They gaslight you, they manipulate you, they promote narratives, and the only one who is not doing that is Robert F. Kennedy Jr.,” Rogan told his millions of young, male listeners, adding, “He's the only one that makes sense to me. He doesn't attack people. He attacks actions and ideas. But he’s much more reasonable and intelligent.”
These comments came among a swell of Trump skepticism from right-wing figures like gun-rights extremist Kyle Rittenhouse, white supremacist Nick Fuentes, and neo-Nazi Richard Spencer. And while Rogan and Rittenhouse subsequently walked back their statements after facing MAGA backlash, it betrays a lack of faith and enthusiasm from those who should be Trump’s fiercest, most excited supporters.
Whatever is keeping Trump off the campaign trail certainly isn’t keeping him off Truth Social, his Twitter clone. His latest rantings there show that he’s even more unmoored from reality.
On Saturday, he claimed Harris has agreed to three debates with him, including one on Sept. 4 on Fox News. The truth? Harris has agreed to one debate so far, on ABC News on Sept. 10.
The same day, minutes after Harris endorsed ending taxes on tips, Trump posted, “Kamala Harris, whose ‘Honeymoon’ period is ENDING, and is starting to get hammered in the Polls, just copied my NO TAXES ON TIPS Policy. The difference is, she won’t do it, she just wants it for Political Purposes!” Instead of holding his own rallies, he was apparently watching hers!
But his craziest outburst came Sunday morning, when he posted this screed:
It almost goes without saying that the crowd-size conspiracy theory was quickly debunked by numerous news outlets.
He so desperately wishes he were still running against President Joe Biden, and appears unable to comprehend that he’s getting beat by a Black woman. Meanwhile, Trump running mate JD Vance is a walking disaster creepily stalking Harris’ campaign events, speaking to crowds of dozens.
Meanwhile, the Harris-Walz campaign is nothing but good vibes.
This joy and fun is even better than Barack Obama’s hope. This is life, and Trump’s ugly darkness is losing the battle.
Help turn the good vibes into a Harris presidency with your donation today!