WILMINGTON, NC — With just three days to go before election day, both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton are ramping up their campaigning efforts in crucial swing states, with Trump holding rallies in Florida, North Carolina, Nevada and Colorado on Saturday.
Early in the day, Trump held rallies in Florida and North Carolina. Trump's wife, Melania Trump, who had largely been absent from the political scene up until recent days, introduced Trump in North Carolina. The state, where Clinton once held a comfortable lead now has Trump with a slight advantage, according to a RealClear Politics polling average. The race, both in North Carolina and nationally, has tightened in the final days of the election with various maps and projections showing a possible path for a Trump victory.
With its 15 electoral votes, North Carolina will be one of the grand prizes on Nov. 8. The state went blue in 2008 but voted Republican in the 2012 election. Another point of concern for Clinton is the low turnout among black voters compared to 2008. Adding to the issue is the thousands of voters removed from the rolls in at least three North Carolina counties, a move that disproportionately targeted African-Americans. On Friday, a judge ordered that all voters removed from the rolls be restored and found that the systematic purging of the voters 90 days before election day was a violation of the National Voting Rights Act.However, a New York Times estimate shows that early voting in North Carolina has been favorable to Clinton's chances of winning the electorate.
Trump's third rally in Reno, Nevada, at the Reno Sparks Convention Center was interrupted whenSecret Service agents rushed the candidate off the stage. There were reports that a man in the audience had a gun.
Law enforcement agents grabbed a man from the crowd and removed him from the space. CNN aired video of the man being escorted by armed officers. After about five minutes, Trump returned to the stage.
His final stop of the night is in Denver, Colorado, where a rally is supposed to start at 9:30 p.m. local time.
The Denver event was scheduled to begin at 9:30 p.m. at the National Western Complex, but the line to get inside stretched the length of several football fields three hours before Trump’s appearance, the Denver Post reported.
Colorado voters supported President Barack Obama in both the 2008 and 2012 elections, and most polls have shown Clinton running ahead of Trump. But the most recent average polls by RealClearPolitics gives Clinton only a 3 percent lead over Trump in Colorado, 44 percent to 41 percent.
Watch a live stream of the Denver event below:
Trump's Nevada rally took place at the Reno Sparks Convention Center. Watch a video of the event below:
In Nevada, where early voting is also underway, numbers in Clark County, Nevada show a big surge of voters from 2012 and an electorate that likely favors Clinton, The Washington Post reported. The Post also reported that the share of Hispanic voters, among early voters, is up compared to four years ago. However, polling average from RealClear Politics has Trump up by two points in the state.
Trump's Wilmington rally took place at Wilmington National Airport. Watch video of the event below:
Image Credit: Rick Uldricks/Patch
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