By james art Donald Trump made a defiant return Sunday to the city where he made his fortune but was also denounced as a criminal, filling New York’s Madison Square Garden for a rally just nine days before the US presidential election.
A rapturous crowd cheered the former Republican president as he repeated key messages from his campaign against Democratic challenger Kamala Harris, promising economic “recovery” and curbing the “immigrant invasion of our country.”
“Issue after issue Kamala has been breaking it, but I’m going to fix it,” Trump said as the crowd jeered the Democratic nominee’s name.
The insult-laced event included speakers who called Harris the “antichrist” and Puerto Rico a “floating island of trash.”
Speakers, including supporters of billionaires Elon Musk and Howard Lutnick, presented Trump as a candidate of peace, prosperity and freedom. They attacked Harris in often harsh terms as a dangerous liberal who had failed to tame inflation or prevent wars in Ukraine and the Middle East.
Supporters often interrupted Trump with chants of “we want you” and “we love you” as he thought he might even win the election by a margin large enough to turn New York, a solidly Democratic state, Republican.
The message was often dark. Trump has emphasized his anti-immigrant themes, repeating claims that illegal immigrants are responsible for rapes and murders across the country. He accused the press of lying and warned that the Democrats would cheat the election.
Grant Cardone, a real estate investor, claimed that Harris and her “pimps” would destroy the country, while talk show host Tucker Carlson mocked Harris’ ethnicity.
A warm-up comedian made a series of racist jokes about Puerto Ricans, Latinos and other ethnic groups that Harris’ campaign immediately latched onto.
The event marked a high-profile return to the city, just five months after a New York jury found Trump guilty of concealing a “hush money” payment to a porn actor.
Madison Square Garden, self-proclaimed the most famous arena in the world, has played host to Muhammad Ali, Pope John Paul II and Frank Sinatra.
But it has also hosted controversial political events, including the German-American Bund “pro-American rally” of 1939, in which Nazi ribbons and swastikas were displayed in front of a giant portrait of George Washington.
Warm-up speakers played down the idea that they were at a “Nazi rally” after Hillary Clinton, Trump’s defeated rival in 2016, this week accused him of wanting to “re-enact” the event.
A backdrop of arena screens told the crowd “Kamala is lying to you”, describing Harris as “weak, failed and dangerously liberal”. Signs handed out to the audience read “Trump will fix it” and “dream big again.”
The rally also included a rare speech by Melania Trump, the candidate’s wife.
Trump’s address in Manhattan, where he won less than 38 percent of the vote in 2020, came at a time in the campaign when candidates typically focus their efforts on a few swing states.
“This is not where Republicans should come, that’s why Donald Trump came here,” said Rudy Giuliani, the former New York City mayor who faces criminal charges for alleged meddling in the 2020 elections in Georgia and Arizona, along with several civil cases .
The Financial Times poll tracker shows Trump and Harris in a statistical tie, with Harris slightly ahead in national polls and Trump slightly ahead in most swing states.
While Trump is not expected to defeat Harris in New York, his campaign may be hoping to help boost the fortunes of Republican candidates in a number of close congressional races in the state.
Mike Johnson, Speaker of the House of Representatives, emphasized the importance of fighting bad votes in New York.
“There’s an energy out there that I’ve never seen before,” Johnson told the crowd, predicting that the state’s congressional races will help Republicans expand their majority in the lower house.