President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump both cautioned that the country would face serious problems if the other wins the White House again during dueling rallies in Georgia on Saturday following successful wins in Super Tuesday contests. This sets them up for a likely rematch in November.
The state was a crucial battleground in 2020, and both parties are getting ready for another close race this year.
Biden began his speech in Atlanta by pointing out that Trump was holding a rally with Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene. Biden suggested that the company Trump keeps says a lot about him. Biden also mentioned that Trump had hosted Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who has weakened democracy in his country, at his Florida club the day before.
Biden stated at the rally that he believes Trump when he says he wants to be a dictator. He emphasized that our freedoms are at stake in the November election.
Biden held the rally at Pullman Yards, an arts and entertainment venue in Atlanta, and received endorsements from several political groups representing Black, Latino, and Asian American and Pacific Islander voters. These groups announced a $30 million commitment to mobilize voters for Biden.
Meanwhile, Trump criticized Biden's handling of the border and blamed him for the death of a 22-year-old Georgia nursing student. An immigrant from Venezuela, who entered the U.S. illegally, has been arrested and charged with the murder. Trump hosted the student's family at his rally in Rome, Greene’s hometown.
Trump condemned Biden's actions on the border, calling it a crime against humanity and the nation. He promised the largest deportation in history and expressed strong disapproval.
Before his rally, Biden expressed regret for using the term “illegal” during his State of the Union address to describe Riley’s suspected killer, which drew criticism from Trump’s team.
At the same time Biden was still speaking in another part of the state, Trump criticized him for the apology, asking if things were becoming absurd.
Trump emphasized that Riley's suspected killer was in the country illegally and should not have been here, and he praised the Trump policy for preventing this.
Trump also highlighted the things Biden criticized him for, mentioning his dinner with Hungarian Prime Minister, Viktor Orbán, and praising Greene for confronting Biden during his State of the Union about Riley, referring to her as “very brave.”
Trump’s rally began with a message urging attendees to stand in support of the hundreds of individuals serving jail time for their involvement in the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection, when thousands of pro-Trump supporters attempted to overturn the 2020 presidential election by halting the counting of Electoral College votes.
The strong language suggested a tough eight months of campaigning coming up in the state.
"We're a real battleground state now," said U.S. Rep. Nikema Williams, a Democrat from Atlanta who also leads the state party.
While repeating his false claims about the 2020 election on Saturday, Trump stated, "By voting for us, we will win Georgia by a huge margin."
Once a Republican stronghold, Georgia is now so competitive that neither party can agree on how to describe the current divide. "A "52-48 state," said Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, whose party controls state government. "We're not blue, we're not red," Williams countered, but "periwinkle," a claim she supports with Biden's 2020 win and the two Democratic senators, Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff, Georgia sent to Washington.
It is acknowledged, at least, that Biden and Trump each have a chance to win — and many challenges along the way.
"Biden's numbers are low for many good reasons, and we can definitely discuss that. So, it makes it possible for Trump to definitely win the race," Kemp said at a recent forum sponsored by Punchbowl News. "I also think he could lose the race. I think it's going to be a lot tougher than people realize."
Biden's margin was around a quarter of a percentage point in 2020. Warnock won his 2022 Senate runoff by 3 points. Kemp was elected in 2018 by 1.5 percentage points but expanded his 2022 reelection margin to 7.5 points, a landslide in a battleground state.
In each of those elections, Democrats held significant advantages in the heart of metro Atlanta, where Biden will be Saturday. Democrats also did well in Columbus and Savannah and a few rural, mostly-Black counties. But Republicans dominated in other rural areas, small towns and the smallest cities — like Rome.
At Trump's rally, in a city near the Appalachian Mountains, over 3,000 people packed inside an event center Saturday to hear the former president speak. His campaign gave out signs featuring the image of Laken Riley.
Candace Duvall, from Hampton, Georgia, wearing a white "Trump 2024," T-shirt, a gold purse that said "Trump" and a pair of earrings that said "Never surrender" on one earring and Trump's mugshot on the other, stated that her candidate is "going to save this country."
She criticized Biden for mispronouncing Riley's name during his State of the Union speech Thursday.
"That happened right here in Georgia. That hits home for us. We know why that happened. We know why," she said, adding that there were too many migrants coming into the country.
Duvall said she thinks Trump is winning over voters who didn't like him before "because they see the difference now" with Biden.
"If somebody gives you sirloin and then they take it away and give you a hamburger, you're going to want sirloin again," she said.
But the same State of the Union address being criticized by Republicans has also been a source of momentum for Biden, who openly challenged Trump's commitment to democracy, U.S. allies, the middle class and the reproductive rights of women.
His supporters thought his lively performance helped alleviate concerns about the 81 year-old’s age. Biden criticized the 77-year-old Trump for holding on to outdated ideas, while the former president has pledged that his return to the White House would mean payback for his opponents.
