Donald Trump is furious and in panic mode because he “feels the election slipping away from him,” according to former aides. Ex-spokeswoman Sarah Matthews told reporters that the former President is “beginning to spiral” as Republicans, even prior donors, turn away, repelled by his repeated attacks on Kamala Harris’s race and his fixation on crowd sizes.
Mr. Trump convened a press conference at his Mar-a-Lago estate and claimed that he had drawn bigger crowds than Martin Luther King for his famous “I Have a Dream” speech, and has repeatedly claimed that Kamala Harris is falsely presenting herself as a black woman to win the support of black voters.
Anthony Scaramucci, a former Trump communications director, said the former President has not done much campaigning in recent weeks because he’s “pi**ed.” Speaking on an online podcast, Scaramucci said Mr. Trump knows he made the wrong decision in selecting JD Vance as a running mate and is lashing out at staff in anger. In a separate online appearance, Mr. Scaramucci even suggested that Trump may pull out of the Presidential race.
Analysts remark that Donald Trump is struggling to frame his arguments against Kamala Harris, and in his distress, he has made repeated missteps. For instance, at a National Association of Black Journalists event in Chicago, he questioned Harris’s racial identity several times, prompting Republicans to privately express their exasperation on Capitol Hill the following day.
Some political commentators have noted a visible discomfort surrounding the former President, saying he felt more secure comfortable fighting a fellow white male but has no idea how to navigate a campaign against a mixed-race woman.
Indicators from inside the Trump camp hint that his strategy will be to portray Harris as a left-wing extremist, although some note that this strategy has failed to land a punch on Harris so far. Trump-critics suggest he has dug himself into a hole that policy differentiation may not get him out of because he has painted such a negative picture of American life and predicted that the country is doomed. On the other hand, Kamala Harris has taken an upbeat, positive, forward-looking approach that appears popular with the American electorate.
