President Trump will hold 14 rallies in the three days before Election Day, focusing a final blitz of appearances on Pennsylvania and the Midwest.
The Trump campaign on Friday announced the president’s schedule through Nov. 2, and the president teased that he may travel on Election Day itself. Trump trails Democratic nominee Joe Biden in several swing states, though he maintains a path to the 270 electoral votes needed to win the presidency.
In a nod to the importance of winning Pennsylvania in order to secure a second term, Trump will hold four rallies in the Keystone State on Saturday.
The president will then hold five rallies on Sunday, all in states he won in 2016 but where he is now on defense against Biden: Michigan, Iowa, North Carolina, Georgia and Florida.
Trump will hold five more rallies on Monday on the eve of Election Day. He will stop in North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, along with two events in Michigan. His final event will be in Grand Rapids, Mich., the same city where he held his final rally of the 2016 campaign.
The president suggested to reporters on Friday that he may travel on Election Day on Nov. 3.
“I’ll give you that answer in the next couple of days,” he said.
Trump is banking on large rallies to carry him across the finish line, hoping the sheer enthusiasm of his supporters will be able to overcome polls that show him trailing Biden in Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and North Carolina and narrowly leading or neck-and-neck with the Democratic nominee in Florida, Georgia and Iowa.
But the rallies may backfire in the middle of a pandemic, as his supporters sparsely wear face masks and cram in by the thousands even as the country sets records for daily infections. In addition, tens of millions of ballots have already been cast in this year’s elections, leaving fewer undecided voters.
Biden has been less aggressive with his travel, visiting three states on Friday for the first time since capturing the nomination. The tentative schedule has worried some allies, but he is expected to be on the road in each of the final days of the race, visiting Michigan alongside former President Obama on Saturday and traveling to Pennsylvania on Sunday and Monday.