2020 race: Donald Trump hopes last-gasp tour will stop the rot

Donald Trump scrambles to defend states he won comfortably in 2016 as Joe Biden expands election battlefield | WATCH LIVE

Donald Trump boards Air Force One on his way to Pennsylvania. Picture: AFP.

President Trump is scrambling to defend states he won comfortably in 2016 while Joe Biden expands the election battlefield fuelled by a large fundraising advantage.

Mr Trump is heading on Thursday to Iowa, which he won by more than nine points four years ago, and two days later to Georgia, which last backed a Democrat for president in 1992. Polls in both states point to neck-and-neck races.

Mr Biden, meanwhile, was in Ohio on Monday for his second visit in two weeks to a state Hillary Clinton lost by eight points but which polls suggest is within his reach.

With 20 days to go until the election, the candidates’ choices reveal how the electoral map has grown to a dozen states from the expected showdown in only three midwestern states plus Florida that were all narrowly seized by Mr Trump from the Democrats.

Mr Trump, 74, appeared back to normal form at his rally in Florida on Monday night, the first since his COVID-19 diagnosis. He has six rallies on his schedule this week as he attempts to claw back Mr Biden’s average ten-point national polling lead.

There are signs of nervousness among senior Republicans, who fear that Mr Trump is leaving it late to win around undecided voters and allowing Democrats to target some usually reliable red states, including Alaska, Montana, Kansas and South Carolina in an attempt to seize control of the Senate.

One third of seats in the 100-member body are contested every two years and Democrats are trying to overturn the 53 to 47 Republican majority, with one reputable study pointing on Tuesday to a net Democrat gain of five.

“Democrats are on fire,” Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, was said to have told lobbyists on a recent call. He is understood to have urged Republican candidates to use any means possible to win their seat, code for distancing themselves from Mr Trump if it helps.

Although there has been little sign of this, Martha McSally, a Republican defending her Senate seat in Arizona, passed up numerous questions in a TV debate when asked to say that she was proud of her support for the president. “I’m proud that I’m fighting for Arizonans on things like cutting your taxes,” Ms McSally, 54, said. She has been behind in every poll since mid-August, while Mr Biden has a 3.8-point lead in a state won by Mr Trump by 3.5 points in 2016.

At the start of the year the election battle was expected to focus on three midwestern states won by Mr Trump by a combined 77,744 votes: Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, as well as the swing state of Florida. In the electoral college system that gives each state a weighted vote, a swing to Mr Biden in these four would hand him the presidency. The Trump campaign has put resources into trying to win Minnesota and Nevada, which both narrowly went for Mrs Clinton.

However, Mr Biden’s growing poll lead amid the president’s handling of the coronavirus has brought two more midwestern states flipped by Mr Trump into play, Iowa and Ohio, and several more that usually back Republicans, notably Arizona in the west, and Georgia and North Carolina in the south.

Joe Biden's motorcade in Pembroke Pines, Florida. Picture: AFP.

More than 180,000 voters in Georgia went to the polls when they opened on Monday, some queuing for five hours.

Mr Biden’s campaign raised a record $364.5 million in August and is outspending Mr Trump almost everywhere. The Trump campaign raised $210 million. Mrs Clinton’s best month of fundraising brought in $154 million.

After the cancellation of the second TV debate on Thursday amid a row over Mr Trump’s health, the president eagerly returned to his attacks on Mr Biden at his Florida rally, highlighting several recent muddles made by the 77-year-old Democrat. Mr Biden seemed to forget the name of the Republican senator Mitt Romney while talking about the role of religion in politics, saying: “I got in trouble when we were running against that senator who was a Mormon, the governor.”

Mr Trump told supporters: “Sleepy Joe Biden, not a nice guy, by the way . . . He had a very bad day today. If I ever had a day like he had today, they’d say, ‘It’s over. It’s over.’ ”

Mr Trump, who was said by his doctor to have tested negative for COVID-19 on consecutive days on the rapid but less reliable antigen test, added: “One thing with me, the nice part, I went through it. Now they say I’m immune. I feel so powerful. I’ll walk into that audience. I’ll walk in there. I’ll kiss everyone in that audience. I’ll kiss the guys and the beautiful women and everybody. I’ll just give you a big fat kiss.”

He stayed at his podium, however, contrasting his “risky” behaviour with the cautious approach to the virus of Mr Biden. “When you’re the president you can’t lock yourself in a basement and say I’m not going to bother with the world,” Mr Trump said.

The Times