Donald Trump hammers home message on the border in penultimate rally

Donald Trump hammered home his message on the border and the economy to voters at a rally in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, this evening on the final day before voters go to the polls.
His 6pm rally took place just across town from Kamala Harris, who hosted the final rally of her campaign a few miles away later in the evening.
Both candidates have blanketed Pennsylvania in the days before the election. With its 19 electoral college vote, it is the biggest prize of the seven key swing states and the one politicos will be watching to determine the outcome of the election.
Despite arriving more than an hour and a half late, the former president buoyed up the crowd with his opening gambit. Channelling former President Ronald Reagan, Trump opened with a question to voters: “Are you better off than you were four years ago?”
Reagan famously asked this question to the American people in the closing argument of his debate against incumbent Jimmy Carter in the 1980 election and went on to win. “My message to Americans tonight is simple,” Trump continued. “We do not have to live this way.”
He compared his vision of America’s economic prosperity with “four more years of misery, failure and disaster” that he claimed voters will face under Ms Harris.
Addressing the crisis at the border, Trump vowed to stop drugs pouring into America from Mexico, pointing out that 300,000 Americans die every year due to drugs coming from the country.
Citing Fentanyl as the most dangerous example of drugs being trafficked from Mexico, he also vowed to follow China’s lead in bringing drug dealers to justice quicker.
Recalling a conversation with Chinese President Xi Jing Ping, who he said he “got on with well”, Trump said he would adopt a Chinese justice policy called “quick trial” that fast tracks drugs offences through courts.
He added that he told President Xi that if China bought “one barrel of oil from Iran”, they would never do business again.
The former president also repeated false claims that Haitian migrants were eating pets in Ohio and, in a darker turn, evoked a violent vision of UFC fighters or the Penn State wrestling team physically confronting migrants. The wrestlers are “the only ones in the country that can beat the hell out of the migrants,” he said.
The speech was at times meandering, a pattern which Trump has taken to calling the weave. The former president offered the audience a visual example of how the weave works at one point, swooshing his arms across his body like a disco dancer to whoops of applause from the crowd.
“I may be the greatest weaver of all time, but what happens only brilliant people can do that,” he said.
Raising concerns about election fraud, a repeated refrain of Trump rallies, the former president predicted it could take 12 days for the election result to be announced. He also claimed it would be better to remove electronic voting machines altogether and revert to paper ballots, which he praised as “very sophisticated”.
In a further prediction of the election result, Trump claimed the Democrats have given up hope in North Carolina, the swing state where polls suggest he holds a narrow lead.
“The word is they’ve pulled out of North Carolina, they cut all their ads and they’re using the money some place else,” he alleged.
The former president sought to project an image to voters of a family man, inviting his children on stage at one point to embrace him.
He was also joined by the son of legendary Puerto Rican baseball player Roberto Clemente, roaring, “I love Puerto Rico,”as he did so.
The decision to invite Mr Clemente Jr on stage marked a continuation of Trump’s charm offensive towards the Puerto Rican community after a warm-up act at one of his recent rallies referred to the country as a “floating island of garbage”.
Puerto Ricans including the actress Jennifer Lopez were among those to condemn the comments.
In a rebuke of businessman Mark Cuban, who claimed the Trump was scared of strong, intelligent women, the former president also invited TV personality Megyn kelly to join him.
Ms Kelly launched a scathing attack of Kamala Harris’ husband Doug Emhoff, claiming he bullies his wife the vice president.
“You see that ad they did about Trump voters trying to encourage women to lie to their husbands so that they could vote for her instead of Trump. That’s their version of what marriage looks like: an overbearing husband who bullies his wife into saying she voted one way, as opposed to an honest, open relationship,” she said.
“Oh wait, I’m talking about Kamala and Doug.”
Trump has finished his speech in Pittsburgh by channelling his former role as the host of the Apprentice, saying: “Let’s fire Kamala”.
After speaking for nearly two hours at the PPG Paints Arena, he added: “We will stop immigration once and for all, we will not be invaded. Everyone will prosper and every day will be filled with optimism and hope.”
Urging supporters to “get out and vote tomorrow”, he said: “This nation belongs to you.
“We will never back down and we will never surrender. Fight fight fight.”
Donald Trump left the stage after performing an imaginary golf swing to the strains of one of his favourite songs, YMCA by The Village People.
Donald Trump has finished his speech in Pittsburgh by channelling his former role as the host of the Apprentice, saying: “Let’s fire Kamala”.
He said winning the state Pennsylvania was the key to winning the US election.
After speaking for nearly two hours at the PPG Paints Arena, when he was joined by three of his five children and celebrity supporters including Megyn Kelly, he added: “We will stop immigration once and for all, we will not be invaded. Everyone will prosper and every day will be filled with optimism and hope.”
Urging supporters to “get out and vote tomorrow”, he said: “This nation belongs to you.
“We will never back down and we will never surrender. Fight fight fight.”
Clemente Jr said: “It’s very important for me to support this man as I believe tomorrow is a change of time… the name Clemente means goodwill, it means unity – I believe your team [addressing Trump] is going to bring it all home, I believe in everything you stand for, for families… and I commit, alongside RFK to making America healthy again” 
Trump then said that Bobby (RFK) had made a big step, as “the Kennedy’s have been Democrats a long time, I’m sure they were thrilled!” and went on to talk about RFK’s passion for America’s health.
Donald Trump has invited the son of legendary Puerto Rican baseball player Roberto Clemente on stage.
Roaring, “I love Puerto Rico,” Trump invited Roberto Clemente Jr to take the mic. The baseball star’s son went on to pledge his support to the former president and said he is in favour of RFK Jr.’s policies to “make America healthy again”.
Clemente Sr. was the first Latin American player to compile 3,000 hits in Major League Baseball history.
Trump’s decision to invite his son on stage marks a continuation of the Republican’s charm offensive towards the Puerto Rican community after a warm-up act at one of his recent rallies referred to the country as a “floating island of garbage”.
Puerto Ricans including the actress Jennifer Lopez were among those to condemn the comments.
Donald Trump has just thanked podcaster  Joe Rogan for endorsing him as US President.
The pair spent three hours together filming an episode of the Joe Rogan Experience, which is the most watched podcast in the world.
“I just want to thank Joe Rogan,” he said.
Caution: contains profanity
The great and powerful @elonmusk.If it wasn’t for him we’d be fucked. He makes what I think is the most compelling case for Trump you’ll hear, and I agree with him every step of the way.For the record, yes, that’s an endorsement of Trump.Enjoy the podcast pic.twitter.com/LdBxZFVsLN
The TV personality has issued a scathing attack on Kamala Harris’ husband Doug Emhoff, claiming he bullies his wife the vice president.
“You see that ad they did about Trump voters trying to encourage women to lie to their husbands so that they could vote for her instead of Trump. That’s their version of what marriage looks like: an overbearing husband who bullies his wife into saying she voted one way, as opposed to an honest, open relationship.
“Oh wait, I’m talking about Kamala and Doug.”
She went on to address allegation against Mr Emhoff that he slapped a previous girlfriend. “I don’t remember a single media person, not one who sat with him asked him about the abuse allegations against him,” she says.
“I’m not into their version of toxic masculinity or new masculinity. I prefer the old version.”
She continues: “Ladies who want a bit of girl power in this election, how can you win when the husbands and the sons and the boys lose?”
TV personality Megyn Kelly has joined Trump on stage at poked fun at Mark Cuban, an American businessman who recently claimed strong intelligent women intimidate Trump.
“I am at a Trump rally, a strong, intelligent woman to prove Mark Cuban wrong,” she says. 
Ms Kelly goes on to drive home the stories of Laken Riley, who was killed by an alleged illegal migrant, and transgender policy. “The boys should not be in the girl’s bathrooms. The boys should not be in the girl’s locker rooms,” she says.
Donald Trump claims the latest jobs report was ‘“fraudulent”. 
Citing figures, he accused the current administration of pedalling “phoney crap” and said that jobs numbers were revised upwards. 
The economy picked up 12,000 jobs in October, the slowest pace since December 2020, as the labour market cooled down following major hurricanes and labour strikes.
It is true, as Trump suggested, that job gains in August and September were later revised downwards. 
Explaining his at times non-sequitur conversational turns, Donald Trump treats rally-goers to a visual explanation of “the weave”, swooshing his arms across his body like a disco dancer.
“I may be the greatest weaver of all time, but what happens only brilliant people can do that,” he says.
“Stupid people can’t do it because they get lost…they can’t weave at all, but I could weave and tell you all these stories and they’re all related, and in some cases not too much. 10 per cent, but 10 per cent is enough.”
Donald Trump says he wants to have a good relationship with China. “We’re going to have a good relationship with China, hopefully, I want to have a good relationship.”
Explaining how he will wield America’s economic might  through tariffs to prevent conflict breaking out with its rivals, he says: “We don’t have to fight with guns.”
Trump has now been speaking for just under an hour at a rally in Pittsburgh and some supporters at the back of the PGG Paints Arena are already starting to leave.
At times it can be difficult to hear Trump, who has a tendency to speak quickly and veer off on tangents that aren’t always spoken directly into the microphone
Donald Trump claims the Democrats have surrendered in North Carolina.
Addressing his supporters, he says: “If [you] vote, it’s over,” he says. “And they know it.
“The word is they’ve pulled out of North Carolina, they cut all their ads and they’re using the money some place else.”
Polls show the two candidates are neck and neck in most of the swing states, but the majority suggest Trump holds a narrow advantage in North Carolina.
In a tender moment, Donald Trump embraces his family and says: “I just want to thank my kids, because they are great kids, and they’ve been with me…right from the beginning.”
Donald Trump has called Democratic Representative Adam Schiff a “watermelon head” at a rally in Pittsburgh.
Mr Schiff, a lawyer who was chair of the House Intelligence Committee, was the lead impeachment manager in the first impeachment trial of President Trump.
The former president went on to claim that “shifty Schiff” has “no neck” and called him “scum”.
Donald Trump has just called his children on stage at his final rally in Pittsburgh.
He was joined on stage at the PGG Paints Arena by Donald Jnr, Eric and Tiffany.
He said his younger son Baron and daughter Ivanka could not make it.
Donald Trump has been joined on stage by his sons Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. and other family members.
He mentions Baron, his youngest and tallest son, is watching the rally at home, triggering cheers of approval from the crowd.
“They love Baron, they love Baron,” reflects Trump.
Donald Trump claims he has been told it may take up to 12 days to count the votes in Tuesday night’s US presidential elections.
“Remember the states are doing the collecting. If you go to a paper system it will cost 8 per cent of what all this fancy machinery does,” he said.
Quoting Tesla and X owner Elon Musk, he said: “There isn’t a computer in the world that can’t be hacked into”.
Donald Trump is sounding the alarm about voter fraud on the eve of the election.
Lauding the benefits of paper (”paper is very sophisticated”), he pours scorn on more modern voting systems.
Addressing delays in vote counting, which have in part been triggered by Republican lawsuits calling for restrictions on the counting of early ballots, Trump says he has heard stories of ballots taking 12 days to count. “Bad things happen when you do that,” he says.
Donald Trump has vowed to stop drugs pouring across the border, pointing out that 300,000 Americans die every year due to “drugs coming from Mexico. 
Citing Fentanyl as the most dangerous example of drugs being trafficked from Mexico, he also vowed to follow China’s lead in bringing drug dealers to justice quicker.
Recalling a conversation with Chinese President Xi Jing Ping, who he said he “got on with well”, Trump said he would adopt a Chinese justice policy called “quick trial” that fast tracks drugs offences through courts.
He added that he told President Xi that if China bought “one barrel of oil from Iran”, they would never do business again.  
Donald Trump claims he made a deal with China’s president Xi to introduce the death penalty for Fentanyl traffickers.
“I had a great deal and a great relationship with President Xi,” he says. “He’s fierce, there’s nobody in Hollywood that could play his role.
“I said to him, you’re killing a lot of people by sending fentanyl into our country…We made a deal, you’re killing our people, and that’s going to end up in bad things for you.
“I want you to do me a favour,” he continued. “I want you to give the same death penalty to these people that are sending fentanyl into the United States, and if you don’t do that, I’m going to tariff the hell out of [you].
“Guess what? He agreed to do it.”
Donald Trump claims that members of the MS 13 gang, who he has repeatedly cited on the campaign trail, ‘sliced up’ young American girls.
“They took two young girls and they sliced them into pieces as they were walking., he says. “They sliced them into they didn’t shoot them, because that’s too quick.They sliced them up and left them dead. Two young beautiful girls walking to school.”
The former president went on to pledge to introduce the death penalty for migrants who kill American citizens.
Donald Trump has boasted that US border control officials told him he was the “greatest President in US history.”
He claims he asked them if they thought he was “better than Lincoln or Washington” and “they said yes”.
Promising the “largest deportation of criminals in the history of our nation”, he added: “We are an occupied country but Nov 5th, 2024 will be liberation day.”
Donald Trump reprised his reference to Springfield, Ohio, where he had suggested Haitian migrants were “eating cats and dogs”.
“Have you heard what’s happening in Springfield, Ohio,” he asked the 19,000 strong crowd.
Donald Trump is joking about a violent vision for migrants, darkly quipping that he told UFC CEO Dana White that the sport’s champions should be made to fight migrants.
“At the end, I want the migrant to go against the champion, and I think the migrant might actually win,” he says.
It came after he claimed that migrants are stealing “countless American lives”.
“They are allowing people to come in from insane asylums and mental institutions, from all around the world from Venezuela to the Congo in Africa,” he says. “They are stealing our jobs and they are stealing countless American lives.
“Thy day I take office, the migrant invasion ends and the restoration of our country begins.”
The former president went on to evoke a violent vision of Penn State’s wrestling team fighting against migrants.
The wrestlers are “the only ones in the country that can beat the hell out of the migrants,” he says.
Donald Trump has suggested that the 2024 election is “too big to rig”.
He told his final rally of the 2024 Presidential campaign, “We did much better in 2020 – a lot of bad things happened.”
Donald Trump has asked the crowd at his rally in Pittsburgh if they saw the Olympic boxing, which featured two athletes who “transitioned” competing against female boxers.
He has also poked fun at Harris for saying there was nothing wrong with Joe Biden.
“If she didn’t think there was anything wrong then there is something wrong with her,” he said.
He was cheered as he shouted: “Kamala – you’re fired”.
Donald Trump is accusing President Biden of presiding over a “communist” economy.
Addressing Mr Biden’s 2020 victory, he says: “It was good because it taught us how bad a communist philosophy is, how bad a Marxist philosophy” it is.
Addressing his own economic record, he says: “I’m very good at business, I’ve always been good at business.”
Donald Trump has told thousands of supporters in Pittsburgh that his message is simple: “Kamala broke it, I will fix it.”
He also poked fun at Harris’s rival rally in Pennsylvania, where Katy Perry joined a string of celebrities in endorsing the Democrat presidential candidate. 
“We don’t need a star, because we have policy,” he said.
Donald Trump is mocking Kamala Harris over her rally, which is due to take place this evening across town.
“Kamala has a little rally going on,” he says. “It’s quite embarrassing. It’s all over the internet. She’s screaming, and the people is about 100 people. They’re not moving, they just, they just want to go home.
“We have more front row Joe’s here than she’s got at her big rally.”
The former president also criticises the star power who Ms Harris has called on to boost her  recent rallies, including singer Beyonce. “She tried to get stars to come in, and they weren’t good,” he says. “Everyone’s expecting a couple of songs, and there were no songs.”
Donald Trump has finally arrived at his final rally of the 2024 US Presidential campaign in Pittsburgh.
He took to the stage and immediately criticised Kamala Harris as a “disaster”.
Declaring: “We’ve been waiting for four years for this”, he added: “Tomorrow I will end inflation and the invasion of criminals coming across our border”.
He also vowed to strengthen the military, and launch “the most extraordinary economic boom” the world has ever seen.
He added: “If you vote for Kamala, our country may never recover”.
Referring to the assassination that almost took his life in July in the same state, Pennsylvania, President Trump said: “God saved me to save America”.
Donald Trump has honed in on the economy in his closing argument to voters. “If you vote for Kamala, you will have four more years of misery, failure and disaster,” he says. “Vote for me and I will deliver rising wages, soaring income and a colossal surge of jobs, wealth and opportunity for Americans of every race, religion, colour and creed.”
Strength on the economy has been a key plank of Trump’s pitch to voters and is an area in which Kamala Harris has struggled to differentiate herself from the incumbent president.
Donald Trump has channelled Ronald Reagan in his opening address to voters in Pittsburgh, asking them: “Are you better off than you were four years ago?”
Reagan famously asked this question to the American people in the closing argument of his debate against incumbent Jimmy Carter in the 1980 election and went on to win. “My message to Americans tonight is simple,” continues Trump. “We do not have to live this way.”
He goes on to claim he will “end inflation”, stop criminals crossing the US border, strengthen the military “restore peace in the world” and “rescue the American dream”.
After a long wait for his supporters in Pittsburgh, Donald Trump has just arrived on stage.
His speech is about to begin.
Former White House press secretary and governor of Arkansas Sarah Huckabee Sanders has just told a Donald Trump rally in Pittsburgh: “The left claims to empower women but it can’t even tell you what one is”.
Referring to the assassination attempts on Trump, she added: “This is someone who took a bullet, who got back out, who never stopped fighting and never will.”
Trump was due to speak at the PPG Paints Arena at 6pm but appears to be running late after attending an earlier rally in Reading, Pennsylvania.
Former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has just told a Donald Trump rally in Pittsburgh that he was “proud” to serve under the former US President. 
Described by the Washington Post as Trump’s “most loyal cabinet member”, Mr Pompeo, a former director of the CIA, said: “We understood that peace matters and that wars were bad. He kept me and my family safe. He made America first again”. 
The Harris campaign believe they have the edge in the final hours of the race, reports suggest.
Late-deciding voters and a surprise poll in Iowa have allegedly tipped in the vice president’s favour with polls about to close, providing the Democrats with a late confidence boost.
“Vice President Harris looks to be in a strong position going into Election Day,” Jamal Simmons, who served as Ms Harris’s communications director until last year, told The Hill. “The data is leaning in her direction and she’s got the gait of a winner.”
It comes as Harris campaign advisers told the Washington Post they are seeing late-deciding voters break for the vice president in the battleground states. The campaign staffers said they have seen a particular increase among young people, African Americans and Latino voters.
Thousands of voters in Georgia’s third-largest county who received their absentee ballots late will not get an extension to return them, the state’s highest court has ruled.
Cobb County, just north of Atlanta, didn’t mail out absentee ballots to some 3,400 voters who had requested them until late last week. Georgia law says absentee ballots must be received by the close of polls on Election Day. 
But a judge in a lower court ruled last week that the ballots at issue could be counted if they’re received by this Friday, three days after Election Day, as long as they were postmarked by Tuesday.
The Georgia Supreme Court ruling means the affected Cobb County residents must vote in person on Election Day, which is Tuesday, or bring their absentee ballots to the county elections office by 7pm.
Board of elections Chair Tori Silas last week blamed the delay in sending out the ballots on faulty equipment and a late surge in absentee ballot requests during the week before the October 25 deadline.
Kimberley Brown, the daughter of legendary NFL running back Jim Brown, has told a rally in Pittsburgh that she is supporting Donald Trump because he will keep men out of women’s sport.
She also said that Trump would be a better choice than Kamala Harris for black business owners – and suggested that he wasn’t racist because his First Step Act had cut unnecessarily long federal sentences and improved conditions in federal prison which had helped inmates from ethnic minority backgrounds. 
At Donald Trump’s rally in Pittsburgh, a pastor has just led the crowd in a rendition of Amazing Grace.
The near 20,000 capacity PPG Paints Arena is almost full to capacity ahead of Trump’s arrival at 6pm local time.
The crowd has now stopped to sing the Star Spangled Banner.
Kamala Harris and Donald Trump made their final pitches to voters today in the same part of Pennsylvania, at roughly the same time, spending the last full day of the presidential campaign in a state that could make or break their chances.
Focusing on Pennsylvania’s southeast corner, Trump took the stage in Reading, about 30 miles from Allentown, where Ms Harris held her own event about half an hour later.
“If we win Pennsylvania, we win the whole ball of wax,” Trump said. “It’s over.”
The Democratic nominee spent all of Monday in Pennsylvania and offered a similarly blunt assessment.
“We need everyone in Pennsylvania to vote,” she said. “You are going to make the difference in this election.”
In addition to Allentown, Harris visited Scranton — the birthplace of President Joe Biden — and had a stop planned in Reading before ending with a late-night Philadelphia rally where Lady Gaga and Oprah Winfrey are expected to address supporters.
A Trump victory in Pennsylvania, flipping its 19 Electoral College votes, would puncture the Democrats’ “blue wall” and make it harder for Harris to win the necessary 270 votes.
A Philadelphia judge has allowed Elon Musk’s $1 million giveaways to go ahead.
Mr Musk has handed out a series of the cheques to registered voters after they signed a petition supporting the US Constitution.
Pennsylvania’s chief prosecutor Larry Krasner filed a lawsuit against the Tesla billionaire claiming the cheques were a scam “designed to actually influence a national election” and asked that it be shut down.
However, Judge Angelo Foglietta has today ruled that the cheques can continue through until Tuesday’s presidential election.
Musk’s lawyer Chris Gober previously said the final two recipients before polling day will be in Arizona today and Michigan on Tuesday.
“The $1 million recipients are not chosen by chance,” Mr Gober said Monday. “We know exactly who will be announced as the $1 million recipient today and tomorrow.”
Hello and welcome. We will be bringing you live updates from this evening’s Donald Trump rally.
The former president and his opponent Kamala Harris are hosting rival rallies in the battleground state this evening.
Both events are due to get under way at 6pm.