Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump planned to spend Tuesday campaigning in battleground Florida, while Republicans scrambled to keep the once-reliably GOP state of Utah from slipping away.
Florida is a must-win state for Trump, according to current battleground state forecasts that project it is next-to impossible for him to win the White House without the Sunshine State’s 29 electoral votes. Trump is scheduled to begin the day in the Miami area and hold rallies later near Orlando and in Tallahassee.
Recent polls give Clinton a slim lead in Florida, a state she can afford to lose if she wins other big states on Election Day. She is scheduled to hold what is likely her final in-person fundraiser in the Miami area on Tuesday while also holding an early-vote rally outside Boca Raton, Fla.
In a sign of Trump’s increasingly perilous position, his campaign announced overnight that Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, the Republican vice presidential nominee, will campaign in Utah on Wednesday. The Beehive State has voted for a Republican presidential candidate in every election since 1968, but recent polls give Trump a slight lead or lock him in a three-way tie with Clinton and conservative independent presidential candidate Evan McMullin.
McMullin is a former Republican congressional aide who is a Mormon and went to college in Utah, his base of support. Some projections show he could become the first third-party presidential candidate to win a state since American Independent Party candidate George Wallace won five Southern states in 1968.
There are no current plans to send Clinton or running mate Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) to Utah, according to campaign aides, who said they are relying for now on regional surrogates.
While Pence tries to stave off an unanticipated challenge in Utah, Trump on Wednesday is scheduled to leave the campaign trail to attend the official grand opening of his new Trump-branded hotel on Washington’s Pennsylvania Avenue.
On Monday, Clinton and Trump launched fresh attacks against the other, signaling that harshly negative closing arguments may dominate the final two weeks of the campaign.
Clinton’s campaign tried to build on its case that Trump doesn’t respect women, while Trump again questioned the integrity of the election process — this time asserting that polls showing Clinton ahead across the country are “phony” and “rigged.”
The most intense rhetoric of the day came from Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), one of Clinton’s top allies, who said Trump’s disregard for women would be his undoing in the election. As Trump continued to suggest that he might not accept a Clinton victory on Nov. 8, Warren seemed to revel in the role that women may play not only in defeating him but also in electing the first female president in the nation’s history.
“I’ve got news for you, Donald Trump,” Warren said, standing on a windswept stage in this college town alongside Clinton and U.S. Senate candidate Maggie Hassan — and riffing on Trump’s reference to Clinton as a “nasty woman” during their third presidential debate. “Women have had it with guys like you. And nasty women have really had it with guys like you. Yeah, get this, Donald: Nasty women are tough, nasty women are smart, and nasty women vote.”
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SOURCE: Ed O’Keefe
The Washington Post
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