Donald Trump holds town hall in La Crosse, Wisconsin with Tulsi Gabbard as moderator
LA CROSSE, Wis. — Donald Trump campaigned Thursday in Michigan and Wisconsin as the former president ramps up battleground state travel heading into the traditional Labor Day turn toward the fall election.
Trump's intense focus on recapturing states he won in 2016 but lost narrowly in 2020 continues with stops in the middle of Michigan and western Wisconsin.
Trump visited La Crosse on Thursday evening for a town hall moderated by former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, who endorsed him in Detroit. It is Trump's first visit to Wisconsin since the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, which ended three days before President Biden dropped out of the race and made way for Vice President Kamala Harris.
Trump supporters started lining up in the early morning hours to get into the event. While all available seats were taken, several thousand were in attendance. It's a smaller venue than Trump usually addresses. Trump likes late, packed rallies, but has admitted his advisors have been pressuring him to stay on message, and they believe the smaller format enhances his ability to do so.
During one speech on Thursday, Trump said if he wins a second term, he wants to make IVF treatment free for women but did not detail how he would fund his plan or precisely how it would work.
"I'm announcing today in a major statement that under the Trump administration, your government will pay for — or your insurance company will be mandated to pay for — all costs associated with IVF treatment," he said at an event in Michigan. "Because we want more babies, to put it nicely."
Gabbard opened the town hall by talking about her own IVF journey, giving herself injections in airport bathrooms and the heartbreak of failed embryo transfers. While the treatments ultimately didn't work for her, she applauded Trump's proposal.
"I can't tell you how life-changing that would be for so many families," she said.
Trump first came out in favor of IVF in February after the Alabama state Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos can be considered children under state law, briefly pausing treatment and sparking national backlash.
Trump has since claimed the Republican party is a "leader" on the issue, even as at least 23 bills aiming to establish fetal personhood have been introduced in 13 states so far this legislative session, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports abortion rights. That kind of legislation, which asserts that life begins at conception, could imperil fertility treatments that involve the storage, transportation and destruction of embryos.
IVF can costs tens of thousands of dollars for medical appointments, medication and surgery, and is not covered by many health insurance plans.
Trump has in general been opposed to various kinds of federal mandates, and originally ran against the Affordable Care Act — also known as Obamacare — which included popular provisions like protections for people with preexisting health conditions.
In a statement, Harris' campaign said Trump shouldn't be believed.
"Trump lies as much if not more than he breathes, but voters aren't stupid," said Harris-Walz 2024 spokesperson Sarafina Chitika. "Because Trump overturned Roe v. Wade, IVF is already under attack and women's freedoms have been ripped away in states across the country. There is only one candidate in this race who trusts women and will protect our freedom to make our own health care decisions: Vice President Kamala Harris."
During the town hall, Trump also took aim at Democratic vice presidential candidate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.
"Minnesota, they picked this guy. He is a weird dude. I'm not weird. He's weird," Trump said. "I would love to win Minnesota because these people aren't digging this guy."
Trump's recent campaign push in battleground states
Trump started his day on Thursday with a rally in Potterville, Michigan, near the state capital of Lansing. Trump won Eaton County, where part of Lansing is located, in both 2016 and 2020, but by a smaller margin the second time. It will be his third visit to the state in the past nine days and second this week after a speech to the National Guard Association in Detroit on Monday.
Trump's visits come three days after his campaign staffers were accused of pushing a female employee at Arlington National Cemetery.
He was at the cemetery for a visit with Gold Star families who lost loved ones during the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan in 2021. An Army spokesperson said the incident was "unfortunate," and added it was "also unfortunate" that the "employee and her professionalism has been unfairly attacked."
Along with Pennsylvania, which Trump will visit on Friday, these three Midwestern states make up a northern industrial bloc Democrats carried for two decades before Trump won them in 2016. Biden recaptured them on his way to the White House in 2020.
Trump and his vice-presidential pick, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, have blitzed the battleground states in recent weeks, with Vance in both states this week as well.
The battleground offensive comes as a reinvigorated Democratic Party rallies around Harris and her new running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.
Harris and Walz are aiming to leverage the surge in enthusiasm among the party's base since her campaign launch just over a month ago. They hope this excitement — which was on full display at last week's convention in Chicago — will extend to more moderate areas as they embark on a two-day bus tour in Georgia, including events in the state's rural southern regions.
Trump's events in Michigan and Wisconsin are both in swing congressional districts.
Potterville is in Michigan's 7th District, which features a mix of Republican-dominated counties like Clinton and Shiawassee, and Democratic strongholds such as Ingham, home to the state Capitol and Michigan State University. This district is expected to be one of the nation's most competitive this fall following incumbent Democratic Rep. Elissa Slotkin's decision to run for the state's open U.S. Senate seat.
La Crosse, meanwhile, is a hub within Wisconsin's 3rd Congressional District, where Republican Derrick Van Orden won narrowly in 2022. Democrat Rebecca Cooke won the Aug. 13 primary to face him in November.