TRUMP BACK ON THE TRAIL. There’s been a lot of talk about former President Donald Trump being tied down in a Manhattan courtroom while his opponent, President Joe Biden, is free to travel the country campaigning. To some Democrats, that almost seems what the Trump trial is all about; the elected Democratic district attorney in Manhattan, Alvin Bragg, has virtually immobilized the Republican presidential candidate during campaign season. That’s a big contribution to the party.
But on Wednesday, the one weekday when trial is not in session, Trump broke out of Manhattan for campaign rallies in the important swing states of Wisconsin and Michigan. They’re the closest of the close states; while Trump has substantial polling leads in Arizona and Georgia, his lead in Wisconsin is just 1.8 points, and his lead in Michigan is even smaller, 1.2 points, all according to the RealClearPolitics average of state polls.
Back on the stump for the first time since his trial began, Trump gave one of the more disciplined, forward-looking speeches he has given in a long time. (This newsletter is based on his appearance in Waukesha, Wisconsin; the Freeland, Michigan, rally took place later.) Here are the basics of the race that Trump needed to communicate: Many voters have a positive opinion of Trump’s time in office and a negative opinion of Biden’s. They are particularly negative about Biden’s handling of the economy and most especially of inflation. So an effective speech would read something like this: economy, economy, economy, inflation, inflation, inflation, Biden, Biden, Biden.
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And that was basically how Trump crafted the Waukesha speech. He talked about stagflation, about tax increases, about the specific effects of inflation, going through the percentage increases in the prices of chicken, baby food, eggs, gas, airfares, and home mortgages, all with 73% of the nation living paycheck to paycheck. “Other than that, we’re doing quite well,” Trump joked before his real punch line: “The country’s going to hell.”
Throughout the speech, Trump returned to Biden and the economy, and he mixed today’s economic hardships with the new identity of the Republican Party: “We’ve become the party of the worker, of the middle income,” Trump said. So he drilled on Biden’s push for government payoffs of student loans and the moral hazard of rewarding some people while others receive no assistance. “Large numbers of people went through years and years to pay off their loans,” Trump said. “[Biden] wants to buy votes.” Trump also drilled on the Biden administration’s obsession with electric vehicles: “They’re giving $7,500 tax credits to rich people to buy electric cars,” he said. Biden “has run the government like Robin Hood in reverse,” Trump said, “stealing from the poor and giving it to the rich.” It is hard to imagine a more concise statement of the realignment that has taken place in the GOP in the last decade.
Trump promised “on day one” to “throw out Bidenomics and replace it with MAGAnomics,” to impose a moratorium on new government spending, to “halt [Biden’s] inflation death spiral,” to “stop the green new scam,” and to “drill, baby, drill.”
Of course, Trump hit other issues, especially Biden’s other great weakness, which is the disaster at the U.S.-Mexico border. Again, Trump dwelled on the effects on ordinary people — not just crime, which has been a Republican emphasis, but also the idea that a country can have an open border or a welfare state but can’t have both. Riffing on that, Trump said Biden’s “insane border policies” are going to destroy the entitlement programs that millions of people depend on.
Trump being Trump, he didn’t stay on one message for the entire hour-plus speech. He played with the crowd a bit, signing the hat of a man in an Uncle Sam suit. He insulted Chris Christie over the former New Jersey governor’s weight, which he obviously enjoys doing. And he once again expressed his chagrin and mortification over having been indicted not one, not two, not three, but four times. As he has said many times before, he imagines his late parents looking down on him and wondering how their son got indicted more times than Al Capone.
But the two main focus points of the speech were the economy and Biden. Trump made use of the entirely unique nature of this race. Both candidates have been president of the United States, and right now, polls show that more voters think Trump was the better president. “When I was president, I delivered four years of peace and prosperity,” Trump said. “When I ran, I didn’t have a record for running the country. … Now I do. … We had peace, we had prosperity.” If he is elected again, Trump said, “I believe we are going to have the four greatest years in the history of our country. We can turn it around again.” If the many, many polls on this race are correct, that appeal hits precisely at voters’ current thinking about Trump and Biden and who will be the next president.
On Thursday, Trump will be back in the courtroom in Manhattan. But he will have shown that even with the restrictions imposed on him, he can still get his message out.