The American presidential election, which will be held on November 5, promises to be particularly close. To try to win the race to the White House, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump faced off remotely on Sunday in two hotly contested American states: North Carolina and Arizona.
On this occasion, the Democratic vice-president sought at all costs to further mobilize the African-American and Hispanic electorates and the former Republican president hammered home his anti-immigration declarations.
Worse than Biden or Clinton
Three weeks before the vote, the polls are still close, but several surveys reveal Kamala Harris’ difficulties in attracting votes among black and Latin American voters.
A survey New York Times/Siena College published on Sunday gives him less than 60% of voting intentions in the Hispanic community – in full demographic growth in the United States – which would represent the lowest level for a Democratic candidate in twenty years. She is only credited with a 19-point lead over her Republican opponent within this strategic electorate in several pivotal states, notably in the South-West, such as Arizona or Nevada, or seven less than Joe Biden in 2020. and 20 fewer than Hillary Clinton in 2016.
On Sunday, the 59-year-old vice-president chose North Carolina, in a region with a large black American population in this state last won in 2008 by a Democrat and which has just been devastated by Hurricane Helene. At a meeting in Greenville, she attacked her rival, accusing him of a lack of transparency about her state of health and of refusing to have a second debate with her. According to her, “Donald Trump is more interested in scaring people, in provoking fear, in stirring up problems rather than helping to solve them, which is what real leaders do.”
Trump castigates “far-left weirdos”
The Republican candidate, aged 78, was in Arizona, a state bordering Mexico. He further indulged in anti-migrant rhetoric, accusing the Biden/Harris government of having “imported an army of illegal migrants” from “dungeons around the world”. In an hour-and-a-half-long speech, he promised that if elected, he would hire 10,000 more border guards and increase their salaries by 10 percent.
Taking his incendiary rhetoric up a notch, Donald Trump affirmed on Fox News that “the National Guard”, even “military”, should be called against the “enemy within” in the United States, against “very bad people […] crazy people, far-left weirdos.”
Our file on the American Presidential election
After these remote duels, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump will both be in Pennsylvania on Monday, considered crucial for paving the way to the White House.
