Trump visits Minnesota and Wisconsin, envisions a grim future if Biden wins
President Trump continued his attacks on Joe Biden as Democrats prepared to kick off the Democratic National Convention on Monday. On campaign stops in Minnesota and Wisconsin, Mr. Trump railed against mail-in voting and claimed that if "Sleepy Joe" is elected, the country will descend into a socialist regime.
The president summed up his election strategy and theory with one line in Wisconsin: "The only way we lose the election is if the election is rigged."
At an event in Mankato, Minnesota, the first of two campaign stops Monday, Mr. Trump made the unproven claim that Biden suffers from cognitive decline while touting his administration's response to the coronavirus and efforts to revive the U.S. economy.
"We built the greatest economy in the history of the world, and now I have to do it again," Mr. Trump said. "That's God testing me."
Mr. Trump joked that Biden doesn't know where Minnesota is.
"I don't say 'Biden' because I don't think he knows what the hell is happening. I think if you mention — if you mention, 'You know, you shouldn't have done that to Minnesota,' he'll say, 'Where's Minnesota? I don't know anything — I don't know what Minnesota is. Where is that, please?'"
The president continued painting a worst-case-scenario vision of the country if Biden wins, insisting he will "change this country around" in an "irreversible" way. He alleged a Biden-Harris administration would take away guns and allow hardened criminals to roam the streets.
Mr. Trump also continued his baseless attacks on mail-in voting, including on the secure drop boxes that many states, including Republican-led states, use.
"They want to send them out, and they want to just have millions of ballots," Mr. Trump said. "They said 'oh, we drop them in a lockbox.'"
There is no evidence that there is widespread fraud from mail-in voting. The president's own commission on voter fraud found scant evidence of it before the commission itself disbanded.
In Minneapolis, Mr. Trump mocked the Democratic convention for featuring "taped speeches," including that of Michelle Obama, whose address will be featured Monday night. "There's nothing very exciting" about taped speeches, he said.
He also attacked the city's recent vote to dismantle the police department. He called council members who supported it "fools," and he falsely claimed Joe Biden want to "take away your Second Amendment."
"Remember this — I am the only thing standing in the way of your Second Amendment," Mr. Trump warned.
In 2016, Mr. Trump narrowly lost Minnesota to Hillary Clinton, but eked out a surprise victory in Wisconsin by less than a percentage point
In Oshkosh, Wisconsin, the president tried to make the case that he deserves the state's votes again — and that Biden would wreck America.
"Biden is just a Trojan Horse for socialism," the president said.
The president joked that the media will go out of business when he leaves office in 16 or 20 years.
Mr. Trump claimed the U.S. is doing well with the virus, even as the U.S. has more deaths than any other nation. The president insisted this year is a must-win for Republicans.
"We have to win the election. We can't play games," Mr. Trump said, adding that the only way he will lose the election is if it's "rigged."
CBS News' most recent poll of Wisconsin shows Joe Biden leading Mr. Trump by 6 points, 48-42%. And the latest CBS News Battleground Tracker shows Biden currently leading in the three upper-Midwest states that Mr. Trump narrowly flipped in 2016: Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Biden also leads Mr. Trump by 10 points in the preference of likely voters nationwide, as was the case in July.
This is the president's first trip to Minnesota in 2020 and his third to Wisconsin.