Mother Nature Puts Crimp in Trump Rally Plans

Saturday campaign event in Portsmouth, NH, to be rescheduled, thanks to Tropical Storm Fay
By Jenn Gidman,  Newser Staff
Posted Jul 10, 2020 1:44 PM CDT
'Make-or-Break' Trump Rally Held Off by Mother Nature
In this June 20, 2020, file photo, President Trump speaks during a campaign rally in Tulsa, Okla.   (AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki, File)

President Trump's campaign staffers have had their eye for some time on New Hampshire as a state they could flip in November, after Trump barely lost there in 2016. That's why an upcoming rally in New Hampshire over the weekend was viewed as an important one, but it's one that will now have to wait. "The rally scheduled for Saturday in Portsmouth ... has been postponed for safety reasons because of Tropical Storm Fay," campaign communications chief Tim Murtaugh announced Friday, per the Hill, which notes wind and heavy rains were expected in the area. Murtaugh says the rally will be rescheduled once a date has been selected. USA Today notes the event was set to be a "test run" of sorts to see if big rallies like this are even worth having anymore during the pandemic, with one GOP fundraiser calling it a "make-or-break moment for Trump."

The president's rally in Tulsa, Okla., last month wasn't as well attended as had been hoped, and before Saturday's rally was put on hold, White House counselor Kellyanne Conway tried to tamp down expectations, per CNN. "I think there are so many millions, literally, of Trump-Pence voters who don't want to go to rallies because they are already supporting the president," she told Fox News on Friday. "They don't want to go to rallies because maybe they're older or they have some of the underlying comorbidities." After criticism that Tulsa's rally was held indoors during the pandemic, Portsmouth's rally was set to be in an open-air venue—an airplane hangar with at least one side open. Before Portsmouth's rally was put on the calendar, Trump's team had planned to have one in Alabama, but that one was nixed due to coronavirus concerns by local officials. (More campaign rally stories.)

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