SHEVILLE, N.C. (AP) — Donald Trump made little effort to stay on message Wednesday at a rally in North Carolina that his campaign billed as a big economic address, mixing pledges to slash energy prices and “unleash economic abundance” with familiar off-script tangents on Democratic nominee Kamala Harris’ laugh, the mechanics of wind energy and President Joe Biden’s son.
The 75-minute speech featured a litany of broad policy ideas and even grander promises to end inflation, bolster already record-level U.S. energy production and raise Americans’ standard of living. But those pronouncements were often lost in the former president’s typically freewheeling, grievance-laden speaking style as he tries to blunt the enthusiasm of Harris’ nascent campaign.
Trump aired his frustration over the Democrats swapping the vice president in place of Biden at the top of their presidential ticket. He repeatedly denigrated San Francisco, where Harris was once the district attorney, as “unlivable” and went after his rival in deeply personal terms, questioning her intelligence, saying she has “the laugh of a crazy person” and musing that Democrats were being “politically correct” in trying to elevate the first Black woman and person of south Asian descent to serve as vice president.
“You know why she hasn’t done an interview? She’s not smart. She’s not intelligent. And we’ve gone through enough of that with this guy, crooked Joe,” Trump said, using the nickname he often uses for Biden.
When he was focusing on policy, Trump pledged to end “job-killing regulations,” roll back Biden-era restrictions on fossil fuel production and investments in green energy, instruct Cabinet members to use “every tool” to “defeat inflation” within the first year of a second term and end all taxes on Social Security benefits and income classified as tips. Specifically, he pledged to lower Americans’ energy costs by “50 to 70%” within 12 months, or a “maximum 18 months.”
But he immediately hedged: “If it doesn’t work out, you’ll say, oh well, I voted for him and he still got it down a lot.”
Trump spoke at Harrah’s Cherokee Center, an auditorium in downtown Asheville, with his podium flanked by more than a dozen American flags and custom backdrops that read: “No tax on Social Security” and “No tax on tips” — a scene that seemed to project the policy heft his campaign wanted Trump to convey.
Republicans had been looking for him to focus more on the economy than the scattershot arguments and attacks he has made on Harris since Democrats shifted to her as their presidential nominee. Twice in the past week, Trump has virtually bypassed such opportunities, first in an hourlong news conference at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, then in a 2 1/2-hour conversation on the social media platform X with CEO Elon Musk.
When he stayed on script Wednesday, Trump contrasted the current economy with his own presidency, asking, “Is anything less expensive under Kamala Harris and Crooked Joe?”
“Kamala has declared that tackling inflation will be a ‘Day One priority’ for her,” Trump said. “But Day One for Kamala was three and a half years ago. Why hasn’t she done it?”
