Former President Barack Obama offered a stark warning on Friday night of dangers posed by a second Donald Trump presidency, pleading with North Carolina voters to cast their ballots over the final days of early voting in the state.
Speaking for nearly 50 minutes to a crowd of hundreds of supporters in the Charlotte Convention Center on Friday, Mr. Obama highlighted Gen. John Kelly’s claims that Mr. Trump had spoken admiringly of Hitler. He laid out the concerns raised by former Trump administration officials and senior Republican White House staff members about what they saw as abuses of power and authoritarian tendencies that made Mr. Trump a threat to America’s democratic principles.
Alluding to recent erratic behavior — such as a town hall where he swayed on a stage to music for over 30 minutes — and incendiary remarks about his political opponents and Americans who died in war, Mr. Obama posited that his successor in the White House was unfit in more ways than one.
“If a family member acted like that, you might still love them, but you wouldn’t put them in charge of anything,” Mr. Obama said. “And yet, when Donald Trump lies or cheats or shows utter disregard for our Constitution, when he calls our service members who died in battle ‘losers,’ when he calls our fellow citizens ‘vermin,’ people make excuses.”
He also repeated many of the same themes that have animated his campaign speeches in the last few weeks regarding Mr. Trump, arguing that his lack of policy plans would harm Americans in almost every aspect of their lives, from health care to housing to groceries. If elected, Mr. Obama said, Mr. Trump’s second term would be more damaging than his first, particularly for middle- and working-class voters.
Those who wish to “shake things up” by voting for him or who feel he would deliver a stronger economy, he added, are misinformed. It was he, Mr. Obama, who was responsible for building up the economy after the Great Recession.
“Please do not give him credit for an economy he didn’t have anything to do with making work,” he said. “Do not fall for the okey-doke. Don’t get bamboozled.”
Democrats see North Carolina as a southern swing state that is within their reach after their repeated presidential losses there. Polls show that Vice President Kamala Harris is narrowly trailing Mr. Trump in the state, which is vital to his path back to the White House. But in key blue corners of the state, turnout among key voting blocs is lagging, leading Democrats to lean on a dose of star power to bolster their closing argument in battleground states.
A visit from Mr. Obama, whose 2008 victory made him the last Democrat to win North Carolina, offers a chance for the party to increase turnout among key constituencies in the Tar Heel State, namely Black voters and young people — the voters who helped power his first and only win there.
Charlotte, North Carolina’s biggest metropolitan area, is also the seat of Mecklenburg County, which has been a heartbreaker for Democratic presidential candidates in recent cycles. In 2020, Joseph R. Biden Jr. lost North Carolina by just over a percentage point, his narrowest loss of the election. Democrats in the state pointed to lower turnout in Mecklenburg County as the cause.
“His presence here will energize the base,” Doug Wilson, a Democratic strategist based in Charlotte, said before Mr. Obama’s rally. Harking back to 2008, when Mr. Obama swept the state, he added that his visit was “a reminder of what is possible.”
This year, the county’s Democratic Party operation is better funded and more organized, state leaders say. And Mr. Obama is looming large — literally and figuratively — over the contest.
“I think that he is going to bring out some people who may have doubts at this point,” said Constance McGee-Alharazim, 57, an independent voter who had traveled to the rally from Greensboro, N.C., and was planning to support Ms. Harris. “Getting people out to vote early is going to be crucial, I think, because once we get closer to the Election Day, I don’t feel like they’ll want to be inconvenienced.”
As the presidential race enters its final days, more than two million people in North Carolina have already cast ballots, outperforming turnout numbers from 2020, according to the State Board of Elections. But Democrats still have work to do in getting their voters to the polls. Turnout in Mecklenburg County has so far underperformed. Over 117,000 more voters had cast ballots in the county by this time four years ago. What’s more, Black voter turnout is lower now than it was in 2020 by almost 40 percent — a worrying sign for Democrats in the state.
Before addressing the crowd gathered in the Charlotte Convention Center’s Crown ballroom, Mr. Obama gave a short speech to supporters who crowded an overflow space outside the room. Nodding to the enthusiasm of those present, Mr. Obama said in his speech: “Let’s face it. If you’re here, you’re probably going to vote.”
The next step, he added, was encouraging others not in attendance to get to the polls.
At one point, Mr. Obama riffed on his “don’t boo, vote” line that has become a slogan among national Democrats. As the crowd groaned while he listed Mr. Trump’s campaign promises, he said of Republicans, “They can’t hear you booing, but they can hear you voting.”
In a brief interview after the rally, Gov. Roy Cooper of North Carolina, one of Ms. Harris’s most prominent allies, said Democratic voters would make up the lag in turnout.
“I believe during the next week that we’ll see a strong turnout in our early vote,” he said, pointing to Republicans’ embrace of early voting in recent months, which has led to an increase in the number of conservative voters heading to the polls. “We’re seeing a lot of votes that would otherwise be on Election Day or just earlier. So I don’t think Republicans have got any more votes.”
The party is also amplifying its voter engagement efforts through big rallies like Mr. Obama’s. The former president spoke at a rally in Georgia on Thursday that the Harris campaign said had drawn more than 23,000 people and was headlined by Bruce Springsteen, Samuel L. Jackson, Tyler Perry and Spike Lee. And as supporters emptied out of the convention center in Charlotte on Friday, Ms. Harris readied to rally in Texas, a historically deep-red state, where she was joined by Willie Nelson and Beyoncé.
In the Tar Heel State, Democrats have grown increasingly bullish, pointing to the changing demographics around Charlotte and the Research Triangle, which includes Raleigh and Durham. They are also likely to be aided by a galvanizing governor’s race between Josh Stein, the state’s Democratic attorney general, and Mark Robinson, its Republican lieutenant governor, whose inflammatory remarks and personal scandals have been an anchor on his campaign.
Mr. Obama has traversed several battleground states for Ms. Harris’s campaign in its final stretch, underlining his enduring popularity among Democratic voters. On Saturday, Ms. Harris will join the former first lady Michelle Obama for a rally in Michigan.
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