Pennsylvania, a key state that will likely decide who controls the U.S. Senate, became a battleground for the titans on Nov. 5, when former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden, alongside former President Barack Obama, campaigned in dueling rallies in the Commonwealth.
All three urged voters to support the candidates from their respective parties, but for very different reasons.
Trump, who was stumping for Oz as well as gubernatorial candidate and current state Sen. Doug Mastriano, told supporters in Latrobe that the United States is being destroyed by the far-left and that Americans need to vote for true “America First” Republicans “in a giant red wave.”
“Every freedom-loving American needs to understand the time to stand up to this growing left-wing tyranny is right now,” Trump said. “If you want to save your rights and liberties, you have to start by dealing a really humiliating rebuke to the radical left in this upcoming election on Tuesday.”
Trump criticized the Biden administration over many of its policies, including the disaster at the southern border and the push for people to buy expensive electric cars, which also increases U.S. reliance on China for battery materials. The former president criticized Biden’s controversial remarks on Nov. 4 about coal plants, saying it was a “slap in the face” to the state’s coal industry.
“Yesterday, [Biden] declared that we’re going to be shutting down coal plants across America—can you believe this?—in favor of highly unreliable wind and solar that cost us a fortune,” Trump said.
Trump also characterized the policies and actions of the Biden administration as being “hostile to liberty, freedom and faith.”
“Before our very eyes, Biden and his left-wing handlers are turning America into a police state like something straight out of a communist country. That’s what’s happening,” Trump said. “We skipped over socialism, that took about two weeks. We’re long gone from socialism; we are into communism.
“With your vote, you can reject left-wing maniacs, you can reject left-wing tyranny and proudly declare that America will always remain a free country.”
Getting Oz elected is now very important, Trump said, as Oz will “vote to end Joe Biden’s socialist spending spree” and fight runaway inflation.
As for Mastriano, Trump called him “a fighter and a warrior for the ‘America First’ agenda.”
“He’s the only person in this race standing between your family and Pennsylvania being destroyed by violent crime,” Trump said.
Trump added: “Doug will clean up Harrisburg, and he will stand up to the special interests. He’ll protect our workers. And Doug will not rest until he has restored public safety to Pennsylvania.”
Biden, Obama Back Democratic Party’s Model for Democracy
At Temple University’s Liacouras Center, Biden touted the upcoming midterms as “one of the most important elections in our lifetime,” but dismissed the idea spread by some Republicans, including Trump, that the vote will be a referendum on his leadership.“Democracy is literally on the ballot. This is a defining moment for the nation,” Biden said. “We all must speak with one voice, regardless of our party.”
Biden slammed Oz as a “carpetbagger” who only recently moved to the state, in 2020, while touting Fetterman and his long-standing ties to Pennsylvania.
“Look, I lived in Pennsylvania longer than Oz has lived in Pennsylvania. And I moved away when I was 10 years old,” Biden said. “John Fetterman is Pennsylvania.”
Biden said Fetterman has “character [and] integrity” and will be a good senator.
“If we elect John Fetterman to the Senate and keep control of the House, we can restore the right to choose in this country by codifying Roe v. Wade and make it the law of the land,” Biden said.
Obama echoed Biden’s claim about the upcoming vote being about democracy, saying: “Truth and facts and logic and reason and basic decency are on the ballot. Democracy itself is on the ballot—the stakes are high.”
He touted Biden’s achievements so far and what the current president could do with two more years of a Democrat-controlled Congress.
“Think about what Joe Biden has already gotten accomplished,” Obama said. “Despite a historic pandemic, he not only repaired the economy and kept unemployment lower, which by the way, you should not take for granted, because a lot of folks thought, with a historic pandemic like that and the shutdowns, we would go into a great depression. And we did not.
“And unemployment is low now because of the actions that he took.”.
The U.S. unemployment rate rose to 3.7 percent in October, up from 3.5 percent in September.
“I don’t know how that’s going to help you. Some of them say, ‘We will impeach Biden,’” Obama said. “Think about that, how is that going to help you, your family, young people, launch a career, start a family, get a mortgage?”
House Republicans have said they’ll launch investigations into issues ranging from the border and fentanyl crisis to Hunter Biden’s business dealings and the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic—if they retake the chamber.
