US Presidential Election | Trump was afraid of losing the state that the Republicans have controlled – the shadow of Obama, Latinos and “Martin Luther King on steroids” are in the way

Republicans presidential candidate Donald Trump was already confident of his victory in North Carolina. So sure that in the previous year and a half he had been there once, last March.

Just three days after Joe Biden announced that he was leaving the presidential race, Trump traveled to North Carolina’s largest city, Charlotte.

“Now we have a new victim to defeat: the liar Terrible Harris,” Trump declared.

Three weeks later, Trump traveled to the same state again, then again a week later on August 21. After Biden’s announcement, Trump has visited as many times only in Pennsylvania, which was already known to be an important swing state.

in North Carolina the dividing line is clear: Trump is supported in the countryside, Harris in the city. Librarian of the Harris campaign Dan Kanninen there is told hoping that Harris would lose in rural areas 60-40 rather than 80-20.

Since 1980, the Democratic candidate has managed to carry the electors of North Carolina only once. Barack Obama narrowly won the state in 2008 by about 14,000 votes.

At the time, Obama was a Republican John McCain the survey closed six weeks before the election, and in the last support surveys the two were almost equal.

“Part of the 2008 turnaround in North Carolina was due to sheer enthusiasm for Obama’s candidacy. That’s what the Democrats are trying to copy now, and Harris’s candidacy has generated a huge amount of enthusiasm,” says a researcher at the Center for the Study of American Politics and Power at the Foreign Policy Institute. Cordelia Buchanan Ponczek.

In the 2012 election, Obama was no longer able to do the same. Now the Harris campaign must rethink its timing between North Carolina and the other key swing states of Pennsylvania and Georgia to pull off Obama’s 2008 stunt.

The latest surveys according to Trump has a narrow lead in North Carolina. There are 16 electors in the division, and with Harris’ Kir, the state is likely to be one of the tightest races in the country.

Enthusiasm for Harris’s candidacy will at least have time to subside somewhat before the November elections, so something else is needed. The state’s population has grown, according to Buchanan Ponczek, especially in urban areas and suburbs.

“In theory, the suburbs are a place for both parties to garner votes, but so far the Democrats seem to have more appeal there.”

The fact that the white majority has shrunk in the state also plays into the Democrats’ pocket. Of all registered voters, whites was in August around 64.5 percent, while for example on election day 2008 there were around 73.4 percent of them.

The New York Times and Siena College’s latest the survey according to North Carolina, the white vote would go to Trump about 56-41.

Democrats are now trying to narrow Trump’s lead in rural North Carolina. The party is hardly capable of winning there. Picture: Allison Joyce/AFP

As voters the number of registered Hispanics has clearly increased, although their share was still small in August, around 4.1 percent.

“Biden had very little traction among Latino voters. Harris now seems to be putting a lot of effort into winning Latino votes,” says Buchanan Ponczek.

Harris has advocated and advocated for nationwide abortion rights, which is the goal of the Latino rights organization Unidos by particularly important to Latinos in North Carolina.

Buchanan Ponczek according to Trump’s attempts to appeal to Latino voters have so far not borne fruit. In addition to the strict line on immigration, the fact that the Republicans sued the North Carolina Board of Elections at the end of August may drop popularity, he says.

In their challenge, the Republicans demanded a more specific reason for the voting lists, so that citizens of other countries could not vote in November. The challenge is not specifically directed against Latinos, but they may see it as a vote of no confidence in their own community.

The election board is the local news media NC Newsline stated that eight citizens of other countries who were illegally on the voting list have been found among the reasons.

The challenge seems to be a continuation of the Republicans’ and Trump’s persistent claims that the Democrats managed to get themselves illegal votes in the 2020 elections. In North Carolina, the matter is therefore on the surface again.

“I noted earlier in 2024 that one of the most important issues for the voters of North Carolina is preserving democracy. It works both ways. Some want to protect democracy from Trump. On the other hand, allegations of voter fraud can drive Republicans to the polls so that ‘undocumented immigrants in our system can’t vote,’” says Buchanan Ponczek.

Add flavor The gubernatorial election to be held at the same time and on the same ticket will be added to North Carolina’s electoral system. Although voters focus on different issues in elections at different levels, the gubernatorial election can have an impact on the presidential election, especially when the core messages of the presidential and gubernatorial candidates are in line, says Buchanan Ponczek.

In the gubernatorial election, the Republicans have had a dismal success compared to the presidential election, and even now, according to polls, a Democrat is on the way to becoming governor Josh Stein.

“North Carolina’s Democratic governors tend to be moderate, pragmatic and open to the needs of both rural and urban voters. This will help them win elections,” says Buchanan Ponczek.

Republicans the candidate is a conspiracy theorist and a preacher who has been vehemently insulting minorities for years Mark Robinsonwhich Trump announced he would support during his March visit to the state.

“He’s like Martin Luther King on steroids,” Trump described Robinson at the time, according to the AP news agency.

Mark Robinson spoke at a Trump campaign event on August 14. Picture: Grant Baldwin/AFP

In March, Trump still seemed invincible, and Robinson’s ramblings had little effect on his popularity. However, the election changed when Biden announced in July that he would give up the candidacy. At the same time, Robinson’s old comments are raised their heads.

“Abortion in this country does not mean protecting mothers. It means killing children for the reason that we were not responsible enough to keep the hem of the skirt under control,” Robinson has stated in 2019, for example.

So far, the Democrats — or just anyone neither have Trump been asked about supporting an anti-abortion conspiracy preacher, and that suits the Republicans just fine.