Harris and Trump Are Jockeying for Battleground States After Their Debate

CHARLOTTE (AP) — Kicking off a day of battleground campaigning by Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, the Democratic vice president is highlighting her support from Republicans who have endorsed her and emphasizing her defense of abortion rights and heath care access.

Harris' pitch Thursday in North Carolina reflects her effort to cast a broad net against Trump in what both campaigns see as a tight contest with less than two months until Election Day.

“Democrats, Republicans and independents are supporting our campaign," Harris told supporters in Charlotte, as she noted her endorsements from Republican former Vice President Dick Cheney and his daughter, former Rep. Liz Cheney, both of whom have called Trump a fundamental threat to American values and democracy.

Harris said the Cheneys and like-minded Republicans recognize a need to “put country above party and defend our Constitution.”

The vice president, seeking to capitalize on her debate performance Tuesday, was traveling later Thursday to Greensboro, North Carolina.

Trump headed west to Tucson, Arizona, as he looked to stabilize his campaign, which continues to struggle to recalibrate nearly two months after Harris replaced President Joe Biden at the top of the Democratic ticket.

The post-debate blitz reflected the narrow path to 270 Electoral College votes for both candidates, with the campaign already having become concentrated on seven swing states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

Harris' itinerary Thursday put her in a state Trump won twice, but his margin of 1.3 percentage points in 2020 was his closest statewide victory. Arizona, meanwhile, was one of Trump's narrowest losses four years ago. He won the state in 2016.

Harris already has turned key moments from the debate into new television and digital advertising, and is promising more travel across the battleground map. Her campaign came out of the debate elated with the vice president's ability to put Trump on the defensive and proposed a second matchup. Trump on Thursday rejected the idea in a post on his Truth Social account.

“THERE WILL BE NO THIRD DEBATE!” Trump said with his signature all-caps, including his debate against Biden in the count.

North Carolina

Harris' approach in Charlotte tracked perhaps her widest path to victory: exciting and organizing the diverse Democratic base, especially younger generations, nonwhite voters and women, while convincing moderate Republicans who dislike Trump that they should be comfortable with her in the Oval Office, some policy disagreements notwithstanding. That's the same formula Biden used in defeating Trump four years ago, flipping traditionally GOP-leaning states like Arizona and Georgia and narrowing the gap in North Carolina.

But it's a delicate balance to assemble such a coalition.

While the vice president played up support from Republicans, she also made a full-throated defense of the Affordable Care Act, the 2010 law commonly called “Obamacare” and passed over near-unanimous Republican opposition. She mocked Trump, who has spent years promising to scrap the law but said on the debate stage Tuesday that he still has no specific replacement plan.

“He said, ‘concepts of a plan,’” Harris said. “Concepts. Concepts. No actual plan. Concepts. ... Forty-five million Americans are insured through the Affordable Care Act. And he's going to end it based on a concept.”

And she saddled Trump again with the Supreme Court's abortion decision to end a woman's federal right, paving the way for Republican-led states to severely restrict and in some cases effectively ban abortion services.

“Women are being refused care during miscarriages. Some are only being treated when they develop sepsis,” Harris said of states with the harshest restrictions.

The vice president added her usual broadsides against Project2025, a 900-page policy agenda written by conservatives for a second Trump administration. Trump has distanced himself from the document though there is a notable overlap between it and his policies — and, for that matter, some of the policy aims of Republicans like the Cheneys.

Harris aides said Thursday marked her ninth trip to North Carolina this year, and recent polls show a tight race. More than two dozen combined campaign offices — supporting Harris and the rest of the party's candidates — have been opened, and popular Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper is one of her top surrogates.

Still, Republicans have been confident about Trump’s chances in the state, and the former president held rallies there in August.

Registered independents — known in North Carolina as unaffiliated — are the state’s largest voting bloc and are usually key to determining outcomes in statewide elections. A state Supreme Court ruling this week affirming that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. must be removed from North Carolina ballots could bring additional votes Trump’s way given Kennedy’s endorsement.

The state's Republican Party has dismissed concerns that a poor showing by its gubernatorial nominee, Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, could harm the electoral chances of other party candidates, including Trump.

Democratic nominee Josh Stein and his allies have hammered Robinson for months on the airwaves and social media for his past harsh comments on abortion and LGBTQ+ rights. Stein, the state attorney general, had a lead over Robinson in several recent polls of North Carolina voters.

Arizona

Arizona's outcome also could be shaped by a down-ballot race. Kari Lake, a prominent Republican election denier who lost her campaign for governor in 2020, is running for the U.S. Senate seat that's being vacated by Kyrsten Sinema.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Harris' running mate, held a rally in the state on Tuesday ahead of the debate, and the Democratic ticket campaigned together there last month.

Trump was last in Arizona two weeks ago for a news conference along the U.S.-Mexico border, where he drove one of his most effective attacks on Harris over the number of people crossing the border to seek asylum, followed by a rally at a former hockey arena in the Phoenix area.

Some Trump supporters in Arizona on Thursday were eager to hear Trump after what they conceded was not his best debate.

“Trump didn’t have his best day,” said David Swanson, 60, of Tucson. “I was actually shouting the answers for him.” Swanson said he still thinks Trump has the upper hand going into the fall, “but it's not a sure thing.”

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Cooper reported from Tucson, Arizona, and Robertson from Raleigh, North Carolina.