Trump dismisses Obama criticism, will campaign in Pennsylvania
President Donald Trump speaks at an event in Wisconsin on Monday. Credit: AP/Mike Roemer
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump is pushing back against a reproach from former President Barack Obama, who is set to speak at the Democratic National Convention.
Trump said in a Wednesday evening news conference that the reason he is now in the White House is because Obama and Joe Biden, his opponent this November, did not do a good job.
“They did such a bad job that I stand before you as president,” Trump said.
He said if they had done a good job, he wouldn’t have even run for president in 2016. "I would have been very happy," he said. "I enjoyed my previous life very much.”
Excerpts of Obama’s remarks released ahead of Wednesday’s convention show he will portray his successor as having unleashed America’s “worst impulses” and treated the presidency as a reality show “to get the attention he craves.”
Trump is returning to the battleground state of Pennsylvania on Thursday to deliver a campaign speech to attack Biden near the place the Democratic presidential nominee grew up and on the same day Biden is to accept the nomination.
Trump will speak at a building products company in Old Forge, a former coal mining town a few miles away from the home where Biden grew up in Scranton before he moved to Delaware.
Trump, along with Vice President Mike Pence, is on a campaign swing through battleground states this week, ahead of the Nov. 3 election, as Trump's campaign surrogates and cabinet members flock to Pennsylvania. Meanwhile, Trump and Biden campaign ads are flooding Pennsylvania's airwaves.
Trump is returning to northeastern Pennsylvania, where he did unexpectedly well in 2016, winning Luzerne County and nearly winning in Lackawanna County, both of which have a solid registration advantage for Democrats.
Pennsylvania’s Democratic Party is under pressure to show it can make the state blue again after Trump won the state by about 44,000 votes in 2016. Biden's boosters in Pennsylvania also see him as well-suited to attract conservative Democrats who drifted to Trump in 2016.
'A different situation at every airport' FAA data analyzed by Newsday shows the number of bird strikes voluntarily reported by airports in New York City and Long Island has increased by 46% between 2009 and 2023. NewsdayTV's Shari Einhorn reports.
'A different situation at every airport' FAA data analyzed by Newsday shows the number of bird strikes voluntarily reported by airports in New York City and Long Island has increased by 46% between 2009 and 2023. NewsdayTV's Shari Einhorn reports.
