On the second day of the presidential debate, which focused on his opponent’s stumbles, former President Donald J. Trump was back on the campaign trail Friday afternoon, clearly elated that he was walking on stage in front of thousands of people in an arena in Virginia and excited about it. its performance.
Mr. Trump used the rally to bolster the now-familiar argument that Mr. Biden is unfit for office, reigniting a debate that has left President Biden’s attacks, lies and exaggerations largely unchecked due to a halting demonstration.
“The question every voter should be asking themselves today is not whether Joe Biden can survive a 90-minute debate show,” Mr. Trump said, “but whether America can survive four more years of Crooked Joe Biden in the White House.”
Seizing on reports that Democrats nervous about the debate were eager to knock Mr. Biden off the ticket, Mr. Trump opined that the Democrats have no better candidate than his opponent, with whom he has engaged in a rivalry for years and with whom he confidently says he will. Defeat despite his defeat in 2020.
And Mr. Trump appeared equally buoyed by the Supreme Court’s decision on Friday that federal prosecutors had abused the statute of limitations to prosecute some of his supporters who attacked the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, in an attempt to overturn Mr. Biden’s victory. Trump in the White House.
To Mr. Trump, the court’s decision — facilitated in part, he pointed out, by judges he appointed — lent credence to his repeated insistence that some of his supporters who were marching on the Capitol, turning to violence, were engaging in political activism. protested and were now only being wrongfully prosecuted because they endorsed him over Mr. Biden.
Mr. Trump told the crowd before him, who was in Chesapeake, Va. gathered in the summer heat, that the court ruled that Mr. Biden’s “Justice Department wrongfully prosecuted hundreds of Americans for peacefully protesting on Jan. 6.”
The remark drew one of the loudest cheers from the crowd during Mr. Trump’s 90-minute speech. Then, in unison, his supporters began chanting, “USA!”
Mr. Trump has spent little time in recent weeks talking about his views on Jan. 6, especially when he made campaign stops in cities like Philadelphia and Detroit, where he appeals to black voters. Following the debate, he made another pitch to expand his coalition, “Whether you’re a Democrat or a Republican, young or old, black, brown or white, we welcome you into our movement.”
Mr. Trump, who has a history of racist statements, continued to try to win over black and Hispanic voters by claiming, without providing evidence, that the surge of immigrants crossing the border illegally was taking away “black jobs.” And as he tries to win over union workers in key battleground states, Mr. Trump has openly courted Teamsters Union President Sean O’Brien, whom Mr. Trump has invited to speak at the Republican National Convention next month.
“I don’t want to throw names around,” Mr. Trump said after referring to Mr. O’Brien, “but he’s a good man.”
But with the debate behind him, Mr. Trump revived strong language that he had dialed back somewhat in recent weeks, including his false claims of widespread election fraud in 2020 and his portrayal of Mr. Biden as mentally unfit to run the country.
Mr. Trump has been sharply critical of Mr. Biden’s leadership, repeatedly knocking his debate performance and using it as evidence that four more years of a Biden administration will steer the country in the wrong direction. And as he stood in Virginia, which has not voted for a Republican president since 2004 but hopes to flip Mr. Trump, he argued that Mr. Biden’s poor performance in the debate was the reason Democrats were ousted from power across the ballot.
“We don’t just have to fire Biden,” Mr. Trump said, as Virginia’s Republican governor, Glenn Youngkin, looked on. “As you saw yesterday, the entire Democratic Party needs to be voted out of office.”
Mr. Trump argued that he would be “very happy” if Vice President Kamala Harris somehow became the nominee because he polled better against her. And he joked, disparagingly, that Mr. Biden was wise to pick her because no one wanted Ms. Harris to be president, an attack that his campaign made in an ad that aired during the debate.
At times, Mr. Trump — who during the debate agreed to accept the results of the 2024 election only if he deemed them fair — looked as if the presidential race was over. He repeatedly referred to a “transition period”, an apparent reference to the post-election period but which he extended to include the months leading up to the election.
“We have a five-month transition period, and I want our enemies to know, don’t play with us.”
Yet Mr. Trump once again repeated his argument that America is more threatened by the “enemy from within” — a reference to his political opponents — than by foreign powers like China, Russia and North Korea, which he said are “if not really enemies. Your have a smart president.”
Mr Trump repeated some of the false claims he made during Thursday’s debate, again accusing Democrats of supporting abortion until “after the baby is born”. No state has passed laws that would allow it, and Mr. Biden did not support it during the debate.
And he again argued that Mr. Biden had allowed a surge of migrants at the U.S. border with Mexico, leading to an increase in violent crime. Available statistics show that violent crime has decreased, and there is no evidence that crime has increased due to immigrants.
Mr. Trump’s supporters lined up for hours in the heat to hear him speak. At least three people needed medical treatment as they waited for the former president to arrive.
Still, the mood seemed jovial. Before Mr. Trump’s arrival, several speakers — a parade of mostly Republicans who occupied various points in the governor’s mansion in Virginia — asked the crowd who they thought won the debate.
Surprisingly, the resounding answer every time was “Trump.”