Trump and Harris battle to win votes in key states on final day of campaign | US elections 2024

Donald Trump raced through four MAGA rallies in three battleground states – delivering a dark and dystopian speech about the “migrant invasion” of murderers and drug dealers – while Kamala Harris put her final word on Pennsylvania on a hectic final day of campaigning for both candidates.

With polls showing the contest between two vastly different political visions essentially deadlocked, both the former president and vice president sought to make their message clear on Monday. While early voting has already broken records nationwide, there is still work to be done to attract undecided and disengaged voters to the polls on Election Day.

Trump began in Raleigh, North Carolina, where he gave what will likely be his final speeches as a presidential candidate at a sports arena on Monday morning. In a 90-minute speech dominated by his vicious stance on immigration, he announced that if elected he would impose a new set of tariffs on Mexico unless it stopped the passage of undocumented migrants across the southern border .

He threatened Claudia Sheinbaum, the newly appointed Mexican president, to impose tariffs on all Mexican goods imported into the United States. “I will inform them on day one or sooner that if they do not stop this onslaught of criminals and drugs coming into our country, I will immediately impose a 25% tariff on everything they send into our country .” USA, he said.

For a 78-year-old, it was an impressive testament to his perseverance that Trump would hold four rallies by the end of the final day of the campaign. After Raleigh, he will address two consecutive rallies in the all-important battleground of Pennsylvania, in Reading and Pittsburgh.

He will conclude his conversation with American voters with a late-night event in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

In contrast to Trump's three-state push, Harris placed her final potential on Pennsylvania. She will start in Scranton, a questionable location to kick off the final day as it is the birthplace of Joe Biden, from whom she has tentatively tried to distance herself in recent days.

Then she will appear in Allenstown and Pittsburgh before reaching the unexpected climax of her bid for the White House in Philadelphia. She will say her final word on the iconic steps of the Museum of Art, immortalized by Sylvester Stallone in the 1976 film “Rocky,” where she will be joined by a host of celebrities, including Lady Gaga and Oprah Winfrey.

In the final hours of the race, Trump showed signs of wear and tear. His voice is hoarse, he looks tired, and his energy level is relatively low.

“The voice is barely holding,” he told the audience in Raleigh.

Trump spent much of his speech in Raleigh straying from his scripted remarks and engaging in long verbal forays that he called his “texture” and that he claimed were a sign of his “genius.” His forays included the anti-climbing panels he ordered to build his border wall, his wife Melania Trump's best-selling book, Elon Musk's rocket launches, the grass that grew on NASA runways before his arrival, and air conditioning and steam baths for dogs.

Trump denigrated leading Democrats, starting with his presidential rival. He called Harris “low IQ” and, in a bizarre interpretation, imagined her “torshing, tossing and sweating” in her sleep.

He also called former US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi “crazy as a bedbug”, Barack Obama the “great divisive” and said he was waiting to “hit back” against former first lady Michelle Obama after she had done it criticized him.

But the focus of his closing argument was immigration and the alleged 21 million illegal migrants — “many of them murderers” — who he claimed were allowed into the U.S. by the Biden administration. Even for a presidential candidate who has focused his campaign on anti-immigrant rhetoric, his closing remarks were bleak.

“They kill people. They kill people at will,” he said, giving gruesome details about specific killings committed by undocumented immigrants. “They just come right into our country and kill people.”

Trump's stop in Raleigh marked his final appearance in North Carolina, a critical battleground state he must win if he wants to have a clear chance of returning to the White House. Although Democrats have won the presidential race here only twice since Jimmy Carter in 1976 (the other time was Barack Obama in 2008), Harris is neck and neck with Trump.

The Guardian poll tracker shows Trump ahead by just one point – well within the margin of error.

In keeping with the rest of the country, North Carolinians voted early than in historic numbers. More than 4 million have already voted, significantly more than in 2020 and 2016, with the party makeup roughly evenly split between Republicans, Democrats and unaffiliated voters.

As part of his final attempt to secure victory on Election Day, Trump repeated the lie that the Biden administration and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) had done nothing to help affected families in western North Carolina after Hurricane Helene. Even this falsehood was related to immigration.

“Fema did a terrible job,” Trump said. “The administration is still not there. Do you know why? Because they spent all their money bringing in murderers, they spent all their money bringing in illegal immigrants.”

In fact, Fema's budget is earmarked for housing undocumented migrants and has no impact on the agency's work in responding to disasters. Fema is directing millions of dollars in federal funds to the hurricane-affected region.

Read more of the Guardian's coverage of the 2024 US election