U.S. President Donald Trump voted early Saturday in his home state of Florida for the November 3 midterm elections, in which his Republican Party is battling to maintain control of Congress.
Trump and his wife, Melania, cast their ballots ahead of a campaign rally in the southern US state of Georgia. He said he voted party line, or exclusively for members of his Republican Party.
Asked by reporters after voting about corruption as a major issue for voters, he insisted that it was happening in districts and cities controlled by Democrats. “You ought to look at the real corruption – it’s Democrat corruption,” he said.
The Republican billionaire, who has consistently refused to accept his defeat in the 2020 presidential election, baselessly alleging voter fraud, reiterated allegations along those lines on Oct 24.
“I ran and I won in 2016, and I won in 2020 too, but it didn’t work out that way,” he said at the Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections office in West Palm Beach. “It was a rigged election, but I won by millions of votes.”
With 10 days to go until the midterms, which traditionally favor the party outside the White House, Trump faces dismal polls suggesting the Republicans will lose control of the House of Representatives and possibly the Senate.
Without a Republican majority in Congress, the 80-year-old president would have little room to push through his legislative agenda during his final two years in office.
He or his staff could also face numerous congressional investigations by Democrats, who have said they want to examine business dealings conducted by Trump and those close to him through the family’s holding company since his return to the White House.
Meanwhile, former U.S. president Barack Obama delivered scathing criticisms of his successor at rallies Saturday in Ohio and Michigan to support Democratic candidates ahead of the November 3 midterm elections.
Democrats are attempting to wrest back control of one or both chambers of the U.S. Congress, which are currently controlled by Trump’s Republican party.
The former president retains considerable popularity among the Democratic base, which he is keen to leverage to support his Democratic Party’s candidates.
In both states, the 65-year-old former president blamed the Trump administration for the rising cost of living, a top voter concern amid soaring fuel prices.
“The current president chose to make a series of bad decisions,” Obama said in Ohio, where he rallied in support of former Democratic senator Sherrod Brown.
“Most importantly, he decided to start an unnecessary war that nobody asked for.”
Later, in Michigan, Obama campaigned for Abdul El-Sayed, from the party’s left wing, who is in a close race with Republican Mike Rogers for the US Senate.
“Imagine the power duo of Abdul and Elissa,” Obama said, referring to the incumbent Democratic Senator Elissa Slotkin, who is not up for election this year.
“You got a Muslim man, you got a Jewish woman fighting for you in the United States Senate. That’s something, Michigan, you can be proud of.”
Obama also urged voters to cast their ballots as soon as possible since early voting is already open in both states.
Polls for Ohio give Democrats a slight lead in both those races, but the results are expected to be close. Nationally, polls also suggest that Democrats could regain control of the House of Representatives but face a much more competitive contest for the Senate. (AFP)
