Trump and Harris hit North Carolina in last-minute election push
Adds Harris remarks in Wisconsin, CHIPS act background
By James Oliphant and Nandita Bose
MILWAUKEE, Nov 2 (Reuters) -Democrat Kamala Harris and Republican Donald Trump head to North Carolina on Saturday to try to clinch support in the southeastern battleground state just three days before Tuesday's U.S. presidential election.
It will be the fourth day in a row that Vice President Harris and former President Trump visit the same state on the same day, underlining the critical importance of the seven states likely to decide the race, which opinion polls show to be on a knife's edge.
More than 70 million Americans have already cast ballots, according to the Election Lab at the University of Florida, below the record early-voting pace in 2020 during COVID-19, but still indicating a high level of voter enthusiasm.
Saturday also marks the last day of early voting in North Carolina, where over 3.8 million votes have been cast, while the state's western reaches are still recovering from Hurricane Helene's deadly flooding.
Harris plans appearances with rock star Jon Bon Jovi in Charlotte, the biggest city in North Carolina, which is tied with Georgia for the second-biggest prize of the swing states. Each has 16 votes in the Electoral College, where 270 are needed to secure the presidency.
North Carolina backed Trump in 2020 by a narrow margin of less than 1.5 percentage points, and elected a Democratic governor on the same day, giving hope to both parties.
"It is my plan and intention to continue to invest in American manufacturing, the work being done by American workers, upholding and lifting up good union jobs," Harris said Saturday morning in Wisconsin, as she left for North Carolina. "That is the way we are going to win the competition with China for the 21st century."
Trump will hold a rally in Gastonia, west of Charlotte, at noon (1600 GMT) before returning to the state in the evening, where he is due to speak at the 22,000-seat First Horizon Coliseum arena in Greensboro.
"This election is a choice between whether we ... have four more years of gross incompetence and failure, or whether we will begin the four greatest years in the history of our country," Trump told a crowd in Michigan on Friday.
POLICY DIFFERENCES
Harris and Trump have very different policies on major issues including support for Ukraine and NATO, abortion rights, immigration, taxes, democratic principles and tariffs, which reflect that schisms between the Democratic and Republican parties.
Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson said Friday that if Trump wins and Republicans control Congress, his party would "probably" repeal the CHIPS Act, passed under Joe Biden's administration, which gave over $50 billion in subsidies to companies for semiconductor chip manufacturing and research in the United States.
Democrats have seized on the remarks. "It is further evidence of everything I've actually been talking about for months now, about Trump's intention to implement project 2025," Harris said Saturday, referring to a conservative blueprint to remake U.S. government and policies that was written with the help of many of Trump's closest advisers.
Johnson walked back his remarks later on Friday, saying the act would be streamlined to eliminate regulations.
Harris and Trump were both in North Carolina on Wednesday, Nevada on Thursday and Wisconsin on Friday - all battleground states - at one point holding events around 7 miles (11 km) from each other.
It indicates the enormous effort put on persuading a relatively small number of voters in a few states, because the other states are seen as safely Democratic or Republican.
But Trump will also visit Salem, Virginia, on Saturday despite polls showing a clear lead there for Harris.
Harris will also be in the swing state of Georgia on Saturday, where film director Spike Lee and singer Victoria Monet are due to speak at a rally.
President Biden, a Democrat, won Georgia by just 0.3 percentage points in 2020, the first time his party had picked up the state since Bill Clinton in 1992.
Democrats will be heavily reliant on Black voters turning out and backing Harris if they want to recreate Biden's success in a state where Black people make up just over 12% of the population.
Hispanics, who total nearly 19% of Georgia's population, are also being fought over. Trump holds a narrow 1.6 percentage-point lead over Harris in the state, according to the polling average from FiveThirtyEight.
Heading into the final stretch, on Monday the Harris campaign plans to hold simultaneous interconnected organizing events across all seven battleground states to mobilize voters, according to a senior campaign official.
Writing by Costas Pitas; Editing by Scott Malone, William Mallard and Heather Timmons
면책조항: XM Group 회사는 체결 전용 서비스와 온라인 거래 플랫폼에 대한 접근을 제공하여, 개인이 웹사이트에서 또는 웹사이트를 통해 이용 가능한 콘텐츠를 보거나 사용할 수 있도록 허용합니다. 이에 대해 변경하거나 확장할 의도는 없습니다. 이러한 접근 및 사용에는 다음 사항이 항상 적용됩니다: (i) 이용 약관, (ii) 위험 경고, (iii) 완전 면책조항. 따라서, 이러한 콘텐츠는 일반적인 정보에 불과합니다. 특히, 온라인 거래 플랫폼의 콘텐츠는 금융 시장에서의 거래에 대한 권유나 제안이 아닙니다. 금융 시장에서의 거래는 자본에 상당한 위험을 수반합니다.
온라인 거래 플랫폼에 공개된 모든 자료는 교육/정보 목적으로만 제공되며, 금융, 투자세 또는 거래 조언 및 권고, 거래 가격 기록, 금융 상품 또는 원치 않는 금융 프로모션의 거래 제안 또는 권유를 포함하지 않으며, 포함해서도 안됩니다.
이 웹사이트에 포함된 모든 의견, 뉴스, 리서치, 분석, 가격, 기타 정보 또는 제3자 사이트에 대한 링크와 같이 XM이 준비하는 콘텐츠 뿐만 아니라, 제3자 콘텐츠는 일반 시장 논평으로서 "현재" 기준으로 제공되며, 투자 조언으로 여겨지지 않습니다. 모든 콘텐츠가 투자 리서치로 해석되는 경우, 투자 리서치의 독립성을 촉진하기 위해 고안된 법적 요건에 따라 콘텐츠가 의도되지 않았으며, 준비되지 않았다는 점을 인지하고 동의해야 합니다. 따라서, 관련 법률 및 규정에 따른 마케팅 커뮤니케이션이라고 간주됩니다. 여기에서 접근할 수 있는 앞서 언급한 정보에 대한 비독립 투자 리서치 및 위험 경고 알림을 읽고, 이해하시기 바랍니다.
