Trump and Obama trade barbs in closing week of US midterm elections - The Straits Times

Democratic former President Barack Obama (right) had kept a relatively low public profile until the past week, during which he has delivered blistering speeches criticising US Republican President Donald Trump.

CHILLICOTHE, Ohio/MORROW, Georgia – Neither man is on the ballot but US Republican President Donald Trump and Democratic former president Barack Obama took prominent roles on the campaign trail on Oct 28, with less than a week to go before congressional races that could shift the balance of power in Washington.

While Trump has been on a weeks-long campaign blitz that has underlined Republican concerns about losing control of Congress for the final two years of his presidency, Obama had kept a relatively low public profile until the past week, during which he has delivered blistering speeches criticising Trump.

Thirty-five of the 100 Senate seats and all 435 seats in the House of Representatives are being contested on Nov 3. Non-partisan analysts generally favour Democrats’ chances of capturing a majority in the House, with the contest for the Senate seen as very close.

On Oct 28, Obama appeared in Morrow, Georgia, near Atlanta, where he urged voters to support Democratic Senator Jon Ossoff, who is challenged by Republican Representative Mike Collins.

While delivering the standard Democratic critique of Trump for imposing tariffs and going to war in Iran, Obama also said America’s values were on the ballot, as he recalled the vision of slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr, who is buried in Atlanta.

“There is a moral component to the choices we face right now,” he said. “We are not going to fix the system that’s broken, we’re not going to unrig our economy, so long as we’ve got a culture where anything goes, where people in the highest offices of the land think it’s OK to lie and cheat and bully, if we continue to have a culture where money is deemed the only measure of our worth.”

Trump’s public approval rating has fallen to a near record low, with Americans increasingly sour on the high cost of living and the Iran war, but he remains an animating force in the party and has campaigned hard to increase Republican turnout. Americans have been voting for weeks, with 40 million ballots already cast, according to the University of Florida’s Election Lab. A total of 45.9 million Americans voted early in the last midterm elections in 2022.

Addressing a rally inside a modest college gymnasium in the Ohio town of Chillicothe, the President appeared with Senator Jon Husted of Ohio as he faces a challenge from Democratic former Senator Sherrod Brown. He attacked Brown for supporting immigration policies that the President said had overwhelmed Springfield, Ohio, with Haitian migrants. “The town went to hell,” he said.

Trump spread false claims during the 2024 presidential campaign that Haitian immigrants in Springfield were eating cats and dogs, allegations that local officials repeatedly said were untrue.

Enthusiastic crowds have cheered Trump at rallies throughout the campaign, but hundreds of protesters lined his motorcade route in rural Chillicothe, raising banners saying “Republican against Trump”, “Grab them by the ballot” and “GOP: Guardians of paedophiles”.

During the rally, protesters interrupted him several times, including at least one who shouted about the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. “I threw Jeffrey Epstein the hell out of Mar-a-Lago,” Trump said in response.

Trump and Epstein socialised in the 1990s and early 2000s, but Trump has said they later had a falling out and that he barred Epstein from Mar-a-Lago, the President’s private club in Palm Beach, Florida.

Justice Department releases from the Epstein files have included references to Trump and many other prominent figures. The department has cautioned that some materials contain allegations that were unverified or uncorroborated.

Protesters have interrupted Trump at virtually all his recent rallies. He typically accuses them of being paid protesters as they are carted off by security.

In Cleveland on Oct 24, Obama poked fun at Trump’s taste in interior decorating, saying: “He’s got the White House looking like Saddam Hussein opened a Cheesecake Factory”, a chain of casual dining restaurants.

Trump defended his White House decor and said Obama left the property deteriorated. “The White House, I think, is the No. 1 symbol of our country, and we can’t have a White House with broken windows, with broken stone that hasn’t been painted in 30 years,” he said in Ohio.

Democrats will need to pick up seats in traditionally Republican-leaning states like Ohio, Iowa or Alaska to overcome the current 53-47 Republican majority in the Senate.

The New York Times reported that aides to Mary Peltola, the Senate Democratic nominee in Alaska, worked with the campaign’s lawyers and senior staff at Senate Democrats’ campaign arm to recruit two candidates who are on the ballot and could siphon votes from incumbent Republican US Senator Dan Sullivan.

Representatives for Peltola did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

“Mary Peltola should resign from the race. I think she should be criminally prosecuted for what she did,” Trump told reporters before departing for Ohio.

In Michigan, where Republican Mike Rogers and Democrat Abdul El-Sayed are locked in a tight race for the Senate seat being vacated by Democratic Senator Gary Peters, both campaigns are relying on high-profile allies to energise supporters and boost turnout.

Rogers spent the day campaigning with Senator Ted Cruz of Texas on a four-stop bus tour culminating in Imlay City, a small community north-east of Detroit. El-Sayed, meanwhile, was scheduled to join Peters and fellow Michigan Senator Elissa Slotkin for an evening canvassing rally in Downriver, south-west of Detroit. REUTERS