Vice President Mike Pence said the Trump campaign is looking to turn Minnesota blue this year and see hanging on to Arizona and Florid...
Vice President Mike Pence said the Trump campaign is looking to turn Minnesota blue this year and see hanging on to Arizona and Florida as key to winning a second term.
But Democratic nominee Joe Biden leads in the polls in all three states with less than 50 days to go until Election Day.
'Florida's of great importance. Arizona's of great importance. We're going to make sure we continue to campaign in those states,' Pence told The Hill newspaper of the 'must-win' states for President Donald Trump.
'We're actually looking at expanding the map now. I've been campaigning in Minnesota. So has the president,' Pence said. 'We think Minnesota is in play.'
Vice President Mike Pence said the Trump campaign is looking to turn Minnesota blue this year and see hanging on to Arizona and Florida as key to winning a second term
Both candidates are spending more time on the campaign trail in the battleground states: President Trump will be in Minnesota on Friday while Joe Biden was in Florida on Tuesday
Pence's comments come as both presidential campaigns are working out the math to get their candidate on the path to the 270 electoral votes it takes to win the White House.
But Minnesota and its 10 electoral votes could be a tough win for the Trump team. In an ABC News/Washington Post poll out Wednesday, Biden led in the state by 16 points.
The Trump campaign has invested heavily in the state after coming within a point of winning it in 2016. President Trump will hold a campaign rally there on Friday evening.
A Republican presidential candidate hasn't won Minnesota since Richard Nixon took the state in 1972.
While Republicans seek to turn Minnesota, Democrats are eyeing Arizona as a state to put in their column this November.
However, except for Bill Clinton’s win in 1996, Arizona has voted Republican since 1952.
Republicans are throwing in the towel however. Ivanka Trump will hold a campaign event there in Wednesday afternoon.
President Trump held a Latinos for Trump roundtable there on Monday that more resembled a campaign rally.
'This is supposed to be a roundtable but it looks like a rally,' Trump told the whooping and cheering crowd of a few hundred people. There was no social distancing and few wore face masks.
President Donald Trump on Monday boasted his Latino roundtable in Arizona looked like a 'rally'
The crowd of over 300 at the president's Arizona event was not socially distanced and few wore face masks
Biden leads in the three states Pence named, which have a total of 50 electoral votes.
He is up by 10 points in Minnesota, according to the RealClearPolitics polling average. He leads by 4.7 points in Arizona, according to the RCP polling average.
But Florida is a much closer contest with Biden up by 1.6 points in President Trump's home state, according to the RCP polling average.
Florida is rapidly becoming Ground Zero in the 2020 campaign.
Biden made a rare in-person appearance in the state on Tuesday on the same day a Monmouth poll showed him leading Trump by five points in Florida.
And Michael Bloomberg announced this weekend he will spend at least $100 million of his own money to support Biden's campaign in Florida, mainly through television ad buys. With 10 media markets, Florida is one of the most expensive TV ad states in the nation.
If Biden wins Florida's 29 electoral votes, Trump's path to a second term is hard to see.
It’s been almost 100 years since a Republican has won the White House without taking Florida.
And, in a show of competitive and contested it is, in six of the last seven presidential races, the Sunshine state has been decided by less than five points.
Biden's two events were focused on Latino voters and veteran communities, as he needs to firm up his support with Hispanic voters and is positioned to make gains from servicemembers after The Atlantic's report that had President Trump calling American war dead 'losers' and 'suckers.'
Democratic nominee Joe Biden campaigned in Florida Tuesday in an effort to boost his support among Latino voters and servicemembers
Biden participated in a socially distant conversation with veterans and military spouses at Hillsborough Community College in Tampa, Florida on Tuesday
'Donald Trump has no idea about the ideas that animate women and men who sign up to serve: duty, honor, country. That's what service and patriotism is all about,' Biden said at the event.
Biden again went after Trump for those comments, which the president denies, while also showing off his stark style difference from Trump by providing tedious answers to veterans' questions during an hour-and-a-half long Tampa event.
'The bad news is I show up when I'm invited,' Biden joked, promising the socially distanced group of six that he would follow-up with them on anything unanswered. 'I'm like the poor relative. The poor relatives show up, eat all your food, stay longer than they should. The wealthy ones don't come.'
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