WEST SALEM, Wisc. — "You're going to see a giant red wave on Tuesday," President Donald Trump told a crowd of supporters in Wisconsin, his second stop on a tour of several battleground states in one day.
Trump began his multi-state tour with a visit to Michigan on Tuesday, speaking to a crowd of thousands at a rain-soaked rally in Lansing.
The president is focusing on several states that he narrowly won during the 2016 election in the final days leading up to Nov. 3. He won Wisconsin by 22,748 votes and won Michigan by just 10,704 votes in 2016.
As coronavirus cases rise in Wisconsin, Trump attempted to downplay the pandemic.
"With the fake news, everything is COVID. COVID. COVID. COVID," Trump told the crowd. "I had it. Here I am right?"
He continued: "You turn on the news, COVID, COVID. You know when they are going to stop talking about it so much? November 4th."
“We will crush this virus," he claimed. "You see the numbers. You see what we’re doing.”
Wisconsin reported 5,262 new coronavirus cases Tuesday, alongside 64 deaths, both of which are record highs.
Wisconsin’s Democratic Gov. Tony Evers accused the White House of giving up on trying to stop the virus and reiterated that Republican leaders are delivering inconsistent messages.
Evers tweeted shortly before Trump’s arrival, “there’s no way to sugarcoat it — we are facing an urgent crisis and there is an imminent risk to you, your family members, your friends, your neighbors, and the people you care about.”
A state appeals court last week blocked an Evers order limiting the size of public indoor gatherings.
Trump told rallygoers he wants the state to further lift coronavirus restrictions, saying, “let’s get your governor to open it up.”
Earlier, the president told the thousands gathered in Michigan that “seven days from now we’re going to win the great state of Michigan.”
“We’re going to have a great red wave,” Trump said of the upcoming election.
Some of Trump’s supporters waited for hours in the wet, near-freezing temperatures to see him.
Trump says their enthusiasm underscores to him that he’s got momentum going into the final days before the election.
Despite claims that his rhetoric fanned the flames of violence against Michigan’s Governor Gretchen Whitmer, Trump continued to rail against the governor on Tuesday, calling the Democrat a “disaster” to chants of “lock her up.”
The FBI recently revealed they had foiled a scheme from an extremist paramilitary group to storm the state Capitol building and kidnap officials, including Whitmer.
Trump noted that his administration’s own U.S. attorneys in Grand Rapids and Detroit were the ones who filed charges against six of the defendants associated with the plot, although seemed to insinuate that the attack may not have been a “problem.”
“It was our people that helped her out with her problem. We’ll have to see if it’s a problem. People are entitled to say maybe it was a problem, maybe it wasn't,” Trump said of the alleged plot against Whitmer. “And then she blamed me for it. I don’t get it.”
After officials announced the arrest of over a dozen people connected to the plot, Whitmer delivered a blistering condemnation of President Trump’s rhetoric surrounding white supremacist and hate groups.
"The President of the United States stood before the American people and refused to condemn white supremacists and hate groups like these two Michigan militia groups. 'Stand back,' and 'stand by,' he told them," Whitmer said, citing Trump's words during the Sept. 29 presidential debate.
"Hate groups heard the president's words not as a rebuke, but as a rallying cry. As a call to action,” Whitmer added. “When our leaders speak, their words matter."
During Tuesday’s speech, President Trump continued to push his baseless claim that “antifa” is responsible for rising violence across the United States. Trump told his supporters that they had to submit their ballots to stop the agenda of such “anti-America radicals” like antifa.
Officials, including Trump's own FBI Director Christopher Wray, have repeatedly said antifa is more of an ideology or a movement than an organization.
Trump also had a new message to suburban women as he campaigns in Michigan: “We’re getting your husbands back to work.”
Trump, who polls show has diminishing support from suburban women, also criticized the restrictions put in place to slow the spread of COVID-19.
Trump told the women in the crowd of thousands in Lansing: “We’re getting your husbands back to work, and everybody wants it and the cure can never be worse than the problem itself.”
Meanwhile, first lady Melania Trump her first solo appearance of the presidential campaign, slamming Joe Biden, Democrats and the media as she stumped for her husband in Pennsylvania.
Mrs. Trump says Democrats focused on a “sham impeachment” instead of the coronavirus pandemic. She denounced what she called Biden’s “socialist agenda” and criticized media coverage of “idle gossip and palace intrigue.”
She defended her husband's handling of the coronavirus pandemic, declaring, “we will triumph over this virus.”
The first lady was diagnosed with the coronavirus earlier this month along with her husband, and she decided against attending a rally with the president last week because she was still feeling lingering symptoms.
The first lady’s event 50 miles west of Philadelphia drew a couple hundred supporters who piled into a converted barn typically used for wedding receptions. The overwhelming majority wore masks, but there was little social distancing.
In his last stop of the day, Trump heaped attention on Nebraska’s 2nd Congressional District.
Nebraska is one of two states that awards electoral votes to each of its congressional districts, in addition to awarding electoral votes for winning the entire state. In 2016, Trump managed to take all five of Nebraska’s electoral votes, but polls show the race for the Omaha area’s 2nd District — and its single electoral vote — could be more difficult this time around.
Trump told the big crowd gathered Tuesday at the city’s Eppley Airfield: “We have to win both Nebraskas.”
Trump added that he believed his appearance could also be helpful with the race in neighboring Iowa, which Trump won easily four years ago but which polls suggest is a tight race this year.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.