'Aggressive' Biden plans to 'ambush a wounded Trump campaign' in April and May: report
As President Joe Biden's campaign picks up steam in key battleground states, the president is planning to blitz the country with a wave of travel and organizing ahead of the November election. A new report suggests the next two months will be pivotal as Biden seeks to overtake former President Donald Trump in swing state polls.
According to Daily Beast reporter Jake Lahut, Biden's reelection campaign has seen a significant boost in both polling and fundraising since his fiery State of the Union address earlier this month. Biden is now leading Trump in the battleground state of Wisconsin, and is tied with his predecessor in Michigan and Pennsylvania. Those three states were what secured the electoral college majority for Trump in 2016, and will likely play a significant role in deciding the winner this fall.
Now, after amassing a war chest tens of millions of dollars larger than Trump's, Biden will be investing in both his ground game and in media markets in the states most likely to decide the 2024 election. Lahut wrote that "the president’s team is ready to seize upon April and May as a crucial time to ambush a wounded Trump campaign."
READ MORE: (Opinion) Voters can stop worrying after Biden's commanding SOTU. Joe's gonna be all right
"It’s aggressive," a Biden insider told the Beast. "There’s a lot of travel, there’s a lot of work. It’s all exciting. We’re heading into this final fundraiser of the month with the former presidents [Obama and Clinton], but it’s aggressive."
Less than three weeks after his address to Congress, Biden has already held events in all pivotal swing states, including in predominantly red states with a chance of swinging blue, like North Carolina and Texas. Trump, in the meantime, has mostly kept to himself, and has only attended one campaign event since becoming the presumptive Republican nominee following the March 12 primary in Georgia. That event wasn't even hosted by his own campaign, but by an Ohio US Senate candidate Trump endorsed. ABC reported that Trump does not currently have any campaign events on his calendar.
The Beast reported that the Biden campaign is spending heavily on grassroots organizing in eight battleground states — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. The president's second bid for the White House will be assisted by roughly 130 new staffers working out of approximately 100 new field offices in those states, where volunteers will be deputized to canvass neighborhoods, knock on doors and call voters.
This will all be happening while Trump is in and out of courtrooms in multiple states. Trump's first trial in Manhattan will take place on April 15, and that's expected to take anywhere from four to six weeks. While none of his three other pending criminal trials have yet to get a definitive date on the calendar, it's likely his classified documents trial in the Southern District of Florida will be next in line, with a possible date of either June or July.
Should the Supreme Court of the United States reject Trump's bid of absolute broad presidential immunity, that would allow Department of Justice special counsel Jack Smith's prosecution of Trump for alleged election interference in Washington, DC to move forward in US District Judge Tanya Chutkan's courtroom. And of course, Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is still waiting in the wings for Judge Scott McAfee to schedule a trial in her prosecution of the former president and more than a dozen co-defendants.
Still, the Trump campaign insists that it isn't panicking despite Biden's edge in fundraising and polling.
"By combining forces and operations, The Trump campaign and RNC are deploying operations that are fueled by passionate volunteers who care about saving America and firing Joe Biden," Trump campaign senior adviser Chris LaCivita told the Beast. "We do not feel obligated however to discuss the specifics of our strategy, timing and tactics with members of the News Media."
READ MORE: There's going to be a criminal conviction': Ex-Trump attorney predicts guilty verdict in NY
