'The gap is closing': Trump’s pending Asheville rally reveals 'battle of turnout and mobilization'

During his hourlong Mar-a-Lago press conference last week, Donald Trump claimed he would lay low and step off the campaign trail until the Democratic National Convention concludes on August 22.

However, the former president is scheduled for a rally in Asheville, North Carolina on Wednesday, August 14 — which sits in a county where "voters have picked Democrats in presidential elections since 2008," according to the Asheville Citizen-Times.

WCIV ABC News 4 reports business owners in the area have expressed "mixed emotions" around Trump's visit to their stomping grounds. While Gentlemen's Gallery owner Alan Levy believes regardless of political affiliation, it's "an honor" to have a former US president visit Buncombe County, Spiritex clothing store assistant manager Adam Mikaelson isn't too thrilled.

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"I work at a sustainable business that supports free speech and a lot of things regarding education [and] equality and these tend to be themes that currently don't align with Donald Trump's politics," Mikaelson told WCIV.

UNC Asheville associate professor Ashley Moraguez explained the possible strategy behind Trump's visit to the Democratic county.

"Because the Democrats have grown their support here, or grown their turnout here, I think it makes sense for Trump to come here to try to counter that," Moraguez told the Citizen-Times. "And I think that’s especially the case because now that Kamala Harris is the candidate … the gap in the polls is closing (in North Carolina). She’s making the state a little bit more competitive."

Western Carolina University political science and public affairs professor Chris Cooper suggested, "Asheville may not seem the most natural place for Trump," but it "is in a battleground state," and "hits multiple media markets in multiple states and clearly Asheville is going to draw from Western North Carolina in general."

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Noting that the MAGA leader is more of a "mobilizing candidate" than a "persuasion" candidate, Cooper said that "Trump is more likely to double down, and try to light a fire under his supporters to not just wear the MAGA hat, but to show up at the polls and bring their friends."

Catawba College professor of politics and history Michael Bitzer emphasized "that in North Carolina, it is a 'battle of turnout and mobilization.'"

The Politics Department Chair added, "It sounds like his campaign strategy and his campaign messaging is still very much tied to the past. Making the argument that that he actually won in 2020, that all these prosecutions against him are really against you, my supporters. If you kind of listen to the new ad that has come out from him ... it is still very much a campaign focused on anger, focused on grievance, and if he does continue down this pathway, I think that that’s probably going to be the major message, yet again."

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WCIV ABC News 4's full report is available at this link. The Asheville-Citizen Times' full report is here.