Donald Trump ramps up campaign appearances in wake of Democratic National Convention

Image via AP.

On the heels of the hoopla from the Democratic National Convention (DNC), Republican Presidential nominee Donald Trump is leaving no swing state unchallenged as he ramps up efforts to get more support from voters ahead of the Nov. 5 election.

Trump is planning several high-profile campaign stumping events in the next week and one of the first is aiming right at Midwestern swing state Wisconsin. The Trump campaign announced the former President will hold a town hall meeting Thursday in a La Crosse, Wisconsin community center to discuss campaign issues with voters.

“After Wisconsin voters have been forced to endure four years of (Vice President) Kamala Harris and (President) Joe Biden’s dangerously liberal policies, President Trump will meet with Wisconsinites to listen to their concerns and share his promising agenda: to make America affordable again,” the Trump campaign said in an announcement.

Trump tried to capture some headlines away from Harris and the DNC last week as the meeting of Democratic Party delegates in Chicago, Illinois generated headline after headline. But Trump’s main attention-getter came Friday when third-party candidate for President Robert F. Kennedy Jr. suspended his campaign after flagging poll numbers and other campaign indicators showing he was not in serious contention for the White House. Kennedy threw his endorsement behind Trump.

Kennedy cited free speech, the war in Ukraine and “a war on our children” as among the reasons he would try to remove his name from the ballot in battleground states.

“These are the principal causes that persuaded me to leave the Democratic Party and run as an independent, and now to throw my support to President Trump,” Kennedy said at an event in Phoenix Friday.

Trump was quick to embrace Kennedy’s endorsement.

“We are both in this to do what’s right for the country,” Trump said, later commending Kennedy for having “raised critical issues that have been too long ignored in this country.”

With Kennedy standing nearby, Trump invoked his slain uncle and father, John F. Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy, saying he knows “that they are looking down right now and they are very, very proud.”

He said that, if he wins this fall, he will establish a new independent presidential commission on assassination attempts that will release all remaining documents related to John F. Kennedy’s assassination.

And he repeated his pledge to establish a panel — “working with Bobby” — to investigate the increase in chronic health conditions and childhood diseases, including autoimmune disorders, autism, obesity and infertility.

Members of the Democratic and iconic Kennedy family have distanced themselves from Robert F. Kennedy’s involvement and support for Trump.

Five of Kennedy’s family members issued a statement Friday calling his support for Trump “a sad ending to a sad story” and reiterating their support for Harris.

“Our brother Bobby’s decision to endorse Trump today is a betrayal of the values that our father and our family hold most dear,” read the statement, which his sister Kerry Kennedy posted on X.

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Material provided by the Associated Press contributed to this report.