Trump sits out Labor Day. Harris doesn't.

The Resistant Grandmother (TRG) imagines what and why may be going on behind the scenes.

The Resistant Grandmother

The setting: Labor Day in Trump’s chambers at Mar-a-Lago.  Trump turns on the TV, viewing scenes of an enthusiastic Harris/Walz rally in Detroit with Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer; a throng of labor leaders; and a huge, wildly enthusiastic crowd in attendance.

HARRIS: “We are all in this together!”  (And, as if talking to Trump directly) “The strength of a leader is who you lift up! Not who you tear down!”  Whitmer then paints Trump as out of touch — there’s no way he can understand the needs of middle class Americans. The crowd goes wild, as Harris, Walz, Whitmer, and the laborites lock hands and hold them high, looking confident and united.

TRUMP: That b****!  What a nasty woman! What’s this togetherness and lift up crap?!  I’ve gotta keep these voter dolts scared and divided, so I can stay on top!  

(Trump angrily clicks off the TV with remote)

The difference between himself and Harris — that “radical leftie from San Francisco” — looms larger in his troubled mind. The thoughts take him back to January and Iowa’s freezing caucuses, his victory there the first sign he would romp to the nomination.  Seems like an eternity, now, though only nine months ago.  He wasn’t there, in Iowa. But that didn’t stop him from dictating from afar to his Hawkeye State MAGA faithful his importance over theirs: “Come out and vote for me. And if you vote and pass away, it’ll be worth it.”  Me over them: the way of Trump World. 

Shaking himself back to the present, Trump turns to his latest poll numbers for validation of his assumed victory in the general election.  He sees that in the battleground states of Pennsylvania, Georgia, Arizona, Michigan, Nevada, and Wisconsin, Harris leads him by anywhere from one-half to almost 4 points. Only in North Carolina does the former president retain a lead, but of only less than a half a percentage point, in a state that was never a battleground until now.  “I’ve still got it!” he says, seeing the glass half full by .5 percent.

But Trump’s reverie diminishes when he notes that nationally Harris has pulled significantly ahead in the latest ABC/Ipsos polling.  That’s bad because pollsters say Democrats must lead by four-six to offset the advantage given to Republicans by the Electoral College.  Now Harris has that.  Suddenly, he wants to talk to someone. Trump presses the intercom and calls his valet, Waltine (“Walter”) Nauta. 

TRUMP: Get my campaign manager up here, now!
NAUTA:  Sure boss.  Wiles and LaCivita are down at the bar, but I’ll get th—
TRUMP:  No! Corey Lewandowski’s my number one now.  Remember that. I pay you to keep up…

NAUTA:  Sure, boss, sure.
TRUMP: (He adds) And after you get Lewandowski, bring me a big plate of fries and a large Coke…
NAUTA: Roger that.  Anything for him?
TRUMP:  Of course not.  Go…
(Trump picks up the remote and returns to the Harris coverage — this time of her Pittsburgh rally in front of another overflow crowd.  Joe Biden speaks glowingly of Harris, passing the torch to the “best decision I ever made as president!” Another popular Democratic Governor, Josh Shapiro, helps fire up his fellow Pennsylvanians.  Again, hands are raised in solidarity, pledging hard work and enthusiasm from now to Nov. 5.)

LEWANDOWSKI:  You need me, Mr. President?

TRUMP:  Uh huh.
LEWANDOWSKI:  OK, shoot…Oh, bad choice (he chuckles self-consciously). Sorry, sir.

TRUMP:  (Not listening, he points the remote at the Harris Pittsburgh rally)  Look at these pictures! Why aren’t I meeting with unions?   All these union honchos showing up, endorsing her…She’s Queen of the Rank and File now.  Those used to be my guys! 
LEWANDOWSKI: Well, we do have the endorsement a couple weeks ago of the Milwaukee Police.  And the Teamsters president was at the Convention. 

TRUMP: Has he endorsed yet?
LEWANDOWSKI: No.  Sean O’Brien’s still holding out. Doesn’t look like he will.

TRUMP:  What does he want?  Whatever he asks, just do it.  I can always back out after the fact.
LEWANDOWSKI:  It’s not like we haven’t tried, Mr. President.  But your crossing the UAW’s picket lines in Detroit last year didn’t play well.  And jobs went away when you were president. They were disappointed you didn’t do anything.  Strong-arming and deal-making isn’t going to work this year.  It’s a credibility thing.

TRUMP:  Well, try harder, God dammit!!  I need a picture of me and O’Brien in the cab of a truck blowing the horn — splashed across every newspaper!
LEWANDOWSKI:  We’ll keep trying, Mr. President.

TRUMP: Now gimme the polls. Battleground, only.
LEWANDOWSKI: Well, we’re seeing some movement in the last two weeks you’ve been pounding Harris. You’re up by as much as a whole half point in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Wisconsin, and Arizona…

TRUMP:  So, I’m leading in those states?
LEWANDOWSKI:  No, Harris does. 

TRUMP:  Well, never mind. We’ll spin the half percent upticks as if I am in front.  Did it on Fox last week with Mark Levin. People will buy anything I tell them, and he said nothing. (Pivots to new thought in stream-of-consciousness fashion) Say, could the polIs be reflecting Smith’s new indictment?  People seeing me as a victim thing? Or could it have been Harris’s atrocious CNN interview on Thursday — what a disaster! Your take?
LEWANDOWSKI:  Maybe yes on Smith, but we don’t have the data yet. Harris’s interview was actually OK for her.  A non-story if anything…

TRUMP:  But she looked ridiculous! All those softball questions. And that desk…!
LEWANDOWSKI: Actually, Bash’s questions pretty much parroted all the stuff we’ve been claiming — her flip-flopping on fracking, the Black versus Asian identity thing, and her position on the Green New Deal – that she won’t entirely support Progressives. She actually came off as moderate.

TRUMP: Oh, c’mon.  She fell flat on her face! She’s a demented los-...
LEWANDOWSKI:  Viewers and critics didn’t think so, even though what you say is, of course, correct, Mr. President.  It came out a net/net for her and no real leg up for us. 

TRUMP:  OK, OK, tight race and all, but we’re still in it. Now we need to show Dems our base is more enthusiastic than theirs is.  Where’s our young male voters?  (Excitedly) The manoverse! You know, the ones who play video games all day when they’re not listening to Adin Ross, the Nelk Boys, and Jake and Logan Paul and their all-about-men podcasts. .
LEWANDOWSKI:  I call it the machismo social media niche, but…

TRUMP: I don’t care what you pretend eggheads call it.  It’s the bearded cowboys who have the ear (he touches his right one, reflexively) of the “I hate women” crowd. 
LEWANDOWSKI:  Good idea, sir.  I’ll book you; Don, Jr.; and Eric again on their podcasts.  You all have real connections with them and they’re eager to get you on as much as possible.

TRUMP:  (Sardonically) They can help offset all those women who hate me.
LEWANDOWSKI:  Well, they’ll help, but not exactly in the numbers we need.

TRUMP: Whaddya mean?
LEWANDOWSKI: The women fired up about Dobbs are growing — a lot, and quickly.  We always knew abortion would drive voting decisions. But new polls show 45 percent of women in swing states — Democrats, Republicans, and Independents — say reproductive freedom is their number one reason for voting, up from about fifth place or lower last year.  And now there are some men’s coalitions in support of the issue. Started in Florida but growing in other red states. So as much as we want to court our manoverse friends, they won’t stack up in numbers against the angry Dobbs women, and now some men.

TRUMP: Don’t tell me bad news without coming up with solutions.  Give me a report on our backup plan to sow chaos in Georgia and other key states on voting day.
LEWANDOWSKI:  Yep, moving forward, Mr. President.  Georgia’s ground zero, just like the last presidential, but for different reasons.  This time Raffensperger has been sidelined by key operatives working for the Georgia Elections Board at the county level.  New laws say they can make what are called “reasonable inquiries” before certifying the election. Could gum up the state’s certification, big time.  

And good for us that the rules don’t specify what exactly is a “reasonable inquiry” and place no time constraints or spell out what documents a board can demand before certifying the results. Naturally, Raffensperger offered his two cents and has called it a “mess” or words to that effect. Democrats are suing. And Kemp is looking into whether he has the authority to fire Board members.

TRUMP:  But he’s campaigning for me, now.
LEWANDOWSKI:  Yeah, sure.  But may be just a smokescreen move.  We don’t know. 

TRUMP:  He won’t do anything.  And even if the courts find against what they’re doing, we’ve always got my six Supreme pawns in Washington to do my bidding.  They’ve done a great job so far. 
LEWANDOWSKI: Fingers crossed.  If you win Georgia and Pennsylvania, Mr. President, you’re in.

(They both smile, menacingly.)

LEWANDOWSKI: (Having once before been fired as campaign manager by Trump, he remembers it’s often better not to bring up any unsettled issues for discussion, even though a candid approach helps win elections. Against that backdrop, Lewandowski fears confronting a possible sore point with him. But the campaign’s success depends on it, so he does.)   

Of course, we’re all anticipating your great victory in November. But there’s not much time between then and now. 

TRUMP: OK, so what…?
LEWANDOWSKI:  Well, sir, you saw that footage of Harris on the campaign trail.  Big crowds, lots of enthusiasm, which is then translated into money and volunteers.  So, what I’m saying, sir, is that it’s important to get you back in the saddle, out with the voters. As you know, Labor Day is seen as the beginning of the official presidential campaign season. We weren’t anywhere, but Harris was all over the place getting airtime and facetime. We need to catch up. 

TRUMP:  Okay, so book some events.  No problem.  But you seem to forget something important, Lewandowski. 
LEWANDOWSKI:  What’s that, Mr. President?  

TRUMP: What other campaigns need to do, do not apply to us.   Sure, we’ve hired those lunatics who aren’t officially part of the campaign to dredge up voters and follow them around until they come our way. (“https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/08/03/trump-allies-ground-game/)
But, bottom line, in my last two elections and the primaries people get out and vote when I tell them to. I don’t need a lot of air time; I can generate excitement any time and place I want.  So where Harris needs her big events in the swing states, I don’t as much, because people jump — and go to the polls —  when I say jump.
LEWANDOWSKI: (Badly wanting to tell him that 2024 is neither like 2016 when he was the change candidate, nor 2020 when he was a sitting president. And that general elections are different from primaries like Iowa where turnout was actually lower than expected. But he holds back. Instead, he says…)

Hundred percent, Mr. President.  Your instincts and rules-breaking have always been right on the money.  I see no reason why they shouldn’t work again.  “Let Trump be Trump!” I always say.  I’ll get going on those podcast interviews and setting up your schedule for this week…and we’ll do our best to keep it light.
(Lewandowski departs, leaving Trump to his thoughts.)

TRUMP (to self):  It just makes sense.  Bottom line, no one’s going to elect an uppity Black liberal broad from that San Francisco hellhole.  I’ve got two months to convince our gullible American voters in the ways I know best.  I’ll support women’s reproductive rights, but be strong on expanding abortion bans, doing away with oral contraceptives, and letting the courts ban IVFs, as my Evangelicals want.   

I’ll also promise to deport immigrants, while also suggesting the country needs more of them.   I’ll say Project 2025 wasn’t anything I sanctioned while ignoring how my close associates created the plan and will be part of my next administration to carry it out.  I’ll say I won’t touch Social Security and Medicare, knowing some voters won’t trust that promise as I’ve broken so many others. 

I’ll also say I won’t touch Obamacare, but plan on canning it for a replacement that will never materialize, just like I did in term one. Bottom line, the more I can confuse people, the faster they’ll give up, believing ultimately that “nothing matters.” And in that place, I can remain president for life.

LEWANDOWSKI: (comes in, again interrupting Trump from his reverie)
Mr. President, RFK, Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard are here for some debate prep, remember?   Ready to head over to the resort ballroom?  We’ve got it looking like the setup for Sept. 10.

TRUMP:  Be there in a few. But first, tell Nauta to send my fries and Coke there.  I’ll eat while I’m prepping.  And tell Kennedy and Tulsi to go light on facts and heavy on conspiracy theories, lies, and insults. You know, the usual “People say…” stuff.  It’s worked in the past. No reason it shouldn’t work this time…

LEWANDOWSKI:  (Leaves Trump and yells to Nauta)  “Move the fries and Coke to the ballroom, Walter.  And tell the bartender to pour me a double Golden Grain whiskey, no ice. And bring it, stat!”

— trg

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