WILKES-BARRE, Pa. (AP) — Former President Donald Trump repeatedly veered from an economy-focused speech into non sequiturs and personal attacks Saturday, including declaring three times that he was more handsome than Vice President Kamala Harris.
At a campaign rally in northeastern Pennsylvania, Trump interspersed his remarks on economic policy with insults and imitations of President Joe Biden and French President Emmanuel Macron.
It seems that it has not been easy for the former president to adapt to his new rival after the Democrats changed their candidate. In the last week, during his campaign speeches, he has deviated from the policies he was supposed to talk about to return to his familiar lines of attack and insults.
Early in his speech, as he lashed out at Democrats for rising inflation, Trump asked his supporters: “You don’t mind if I stop using the teleprompter for a second, do you? Joe Biden hates it.”
Harris campaign spokesman Joseph Costello responded to Trump in a statement, saying: “Another rally, but the same old spectacle,” adding that Trump “resorts to lies, insults and confusing ramblings” because he cannot sell his campaign agenda.
“The more Americans hear Trump speak, the clearer the choice will be this November: Vice President Harris is unifying voters with her positive vision to protect our freedoms, build the middle class, and move America forward, while Donald Trump is trying to take us backwards,” Costello said.
Trump’s Wilkes-Barre rally was held in one of the most contested states where he hopes conservative, white, working-class voters, near Biden’s hometown of Scranton, will help him return to the White House.
His remarks Saturday came as Democrats prepare for their four-day national convention that begins Monday in Chicago, during which the party will welcome Harris as its nominee. The party’s decision to replace Biden less than four months before the November election has given Democrats and their coalition a new boost. It also presents a new challenge for Trump.
Trump sharply criticized Harris on the economy, linking her to the Biden administration’s inflation problems and comparing her latest proposal against price gouging to measures taken in communist countries. Trump has said a federal ban on food price gouging will lead to food shortages, rationing and hunger. On Saturday, he questioned why she hadn’t worked to address prices when she and Biden took office in 2021.
“Kamala’s first day was three and a half years ago. So why didn’t she do it then? So this is day 1,305,” Trump said.
Commenting on Harris’ recent image on the cover of Time magazine, he emphasized the image’s resemblance to classic Hollywood icons Sophia Loren and Elizabeth Taylor and then took issue with a Wall Street Journal columnist who commented earlier this month on Harris’ beauty.
“I’m a lot better looking than her,” Trump said, drawing laughter from the crowd. “I’m a better looking person than Kamala.”
He also took issue with the way his own style is typically described in news reports.
“They will say I am rambling. I am not rambling. I am a really smart guy,” he said.
Trump’s rally on Saturday was his fifth at the stadium in Wilkes-Barre, the largest city in Luzerne County, where he has scored victories in the past two elections. Biden outperformed Trump in neighboring Lackawanna County, where the Democrat has long promoted his working-class roots in Scranton.
On Sunday, Harris plans a bus tour that will begin in Pittsburgh and stop in Rochester, a small town to the north. Trump has scheduled a visit Monday to a plant that makes nuclear fuel containers in York. Trump’s running mate, J.D. Vance, is expected to be in Philadelphia that day.
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Price reported from New York. Associated Press writers Bill Barrow in Atlanta and Darlene Superville in Arlington, Virginia, contributed to this report.
