WASHINGTON (AP) — Former President Donald Trump held a rally on Long Island Wednesday as he took a break from campaigning in the toss-up states that will likely decide the Nov. 5 election.
The Republican nominee drew a large, roaring crowd, giving him a chance to show deep support even in a blue state.
He ripped into Democratic leadership in New York City and state, blaming them for homeless people living in what he called “horrible, disgusting, dangerous, filthy encampments,” and even the conditions on the New York City subway, which he called “squalid and unsafe” and promised to renovate.
Trump has also promised to carry out “the largest deportation operation in the history of our country” if he’s elected in November. He has offered no details on how such an operation would work.
Trump leaned heavily on his alarmist message Wednesday, focusing the bulk of his remarks on immigration.
“Look at what’s happening,” he told his crowd in New York. “Businesses that are fleeing, money draining out of your state and hundreds of thousands of illegal migrants sucking your public resources dry.”
“You got to get rid of these people. Give me a shot,” Trump said in asking for their votes.
Trump said he plans in the next two weeks to visit Springfield, Ohio, that’s been the center of false accusations from the former president and his running mate, JD Vance, that members of the city’s Haitian community are abducting and eating cats and dogs.
Trump also said he plans to visit Aurora, Colo., where he says a Venezuelan street gang with a small presence in the city has taken over a rundown apartment complex. Aurora police say that’s not the case.
Trump has an advantage over Vice President Kamala Harris in opinion polling on whom voters trust to better handle the issue of immigration.
Trump’s rally Wednesday night was in Uniondale, an area that could be key to Republicans maintaining control of the House. His party is trying to protect 18 Republicans in Democratic-heavy congressional districts that Joe Biden carried in 2020, particularly in coastal New York and California, and going on offense to challenge Democrats elsewhere.
Long Island in particular features one of the most closely watched races, between first-term Republican Rep. Anthony D’Esposito and Democrat Laura Gillen. D’Esposito is a former New York Police detective who won in 2022 in a district that Biden won by about 15 percentage points in 2020.
Trump posted Tuesday on his Truth Social platform that the GOP has “a real chance of winning” New York “for the first time in many decades.”
In that same post, Trump also pledged that he would “get SALT back,” suggesting he would eliminate a cap on state and local tax deductions that were part of tax cut legislation he signed into law in 2017.
The so-called SALT cap has led to bigger tax bills for many residents of New York, New Jersey, California and other high-cost, high-tax states, and is an important campaign issue in those states, particularly among those New York Republicans serving in districts Biden won.
Trump is attempting to return to his campaign cadence after Sunday’s apparent assassination attempt as he golfed in Florida. On Tuesday, he traveled to Flint, Mich., and has not appeared to alter plans for upcoming trips to the nation’s capital and North Carolina later in the week.
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