Obama urges Black men to show up for Harris as he campaigns in critical Pennsylvania

PITTSBURGH (AP) — Former President Barack Obama gave a blistering critique of his White House successor Donald Trump and urged Black men to show up for Kamala Harris as he campaigned in Pittsburgh on Thursday at the start of a swing-state tour for the Democratic ticket.

At a campaign field office to thank volunteers, Obama said he wanted to “speak some truths” after hearing reports on the ground that there was lower enthusiasm for Harris than there was for his own candidacy and that some Black men were thinking of sitting out the election.

“Part of it makes me think — and I’m speaking to men directly — part of it makes me think that, well, you just aren’t feeling the idea of having a woman as president, and you’re coming up with other alternatives and other reasons for that,” Obama said.

The former president said Trump’s penchant for putting people down was not real strength.

“You’re thinking about sitting out or supporting somebody who has a history of denigrating you, because you think that’s a sign of strength, because that’s what being a man is? Putting women down? That’s not acceptable,” Obama said.

The Democratic former president made the battleground state of Pennsylvania the first stop of his campaign tour with less than four weeks until Election Day and as voting is already underway. Speaking at a rally at the University of Pittsburgh, he painted Trump as out-of-touch and not the choice to lead the country to change, calling him a “bumbling” billionaire “who has not stopped whining about his problems since he rode down his golden escalator nine years ago."

He said Harris is “a leader who has spent her life fighting on behalf of people who need a voice and a chance” and declared, “Kamala is as prepared for the job as any nominee for president has ever been."

Obama, eight years out of power, has been one of the Democratic Party’s most reliable surrogates to galvanize voters. Until he was elected president in 2020, Joe Biden had also taken on that role for Democrats, but this year, since ending his reelection campaign and letting Harris ascend to the ticket, he’s yet to hit the trail.

Obama, who received a roaring welcome from the crowd, described Trump’s all-caps posts on social media and his “ranting and the raving about crazy conspiracy theories. The two-hour speeches, word salad, just — it’s like Fidel Castro. Just on and on. Constant attempts to sell you stuff. Who does that?”

Obama listed some of the products Trump has tried to sell during his third White House campaign, including $399 gold sneakers, a $100,000 watch and his “God Bless the USA” Bible for $59.99.

“He wants you to buy the word of God: Donald Trump edition. Got his name right there next to Matthew and Luke,” Obama said, laughing. “You could not make this stuff up.”

As the nation’s first Black president, Obama's appearance for Harris underscores the history-making nature of her own political career. Harris, the first woman, Black person or person of South Asian descent to serve as vice president, would be the first woman to serve as president if elected next month.

His old campaign rallying cry, “Yes, We Can,” was even refashioned for the event, with “Yes, She Can” beaming on a screen over the crowd.

Both Harris and Trump have been vying for support from Black Americans. A recent poll from the  AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that about 7 in 10 Black voters have a somewhat or very favorable view of Harris, with few differences between Black male and female voters on how they view the Democratic candidate.

Black voters’ opinions of Trump, by contrast, were overwhelmingly negative, according to the poll, but the former president believes his message on the economy, immigration and traditional values can make inroads into the Democrats’ traditional base of support among Black voters, especially younger Black men.

Obama acknowledged that the last few years, starting with the pandemic, have been hard for Americans, with high prices and other impacts putting a squeeze on working families.

“I get it, why people are looking to shake things up. I mean, I am the hopey-changey guy. So I understand people feeling frustrated and feeling we can do better,” Obama said. “What I cannot understand is why anybody would think that Donald Trump will shake things up in a way that is good for you, Pennsylvania.”

He mocked Trump’s answer in the debate that he would replace Obama’s signature health care law, the Affordable Care Act, with “concepts of a plan,” and his running mate JD Vance’s recent comment that Trump worked to “salvage” the law.

“Donald Trump spent his entire presidency trying to tear it down. And by the way, he couldn’t even do that right.”

Obama also referenced a new court filing in the federal election interference case against Trump that said Trump told an aide, “So what?” after being told his vice president, Mike Pence, had been rushed to a safe location after a violent crowd of Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

“If Donald Trump does not care that a mob might attack his own vice president, do you think he cares about you?” he asked.

Glenda Ellison, a 71-year-old retired schoolteacher and Democrat from Pittsburgh, said she is feeling “a little nervous” about the election but “prayerful that it’s going to turn out in our favor.”

Ellison said she sees Obama as a party spokesperson with a large following who can hopefully sway voters that might be on the fence about voting for Harris.

“As a former president, and also as a Black president, I think that is something that might connect with the African American community, the fact that we do have our Black president supporting another Black candidate,” said Ellison, who is Black.

Obama was among the key Democrats who were part of a behind-the-scenes effort to encourage Biden, his former vice president, to drop out of the 2024 race.

Obama and Harris have been friends for two decades since he ran for Senate in Illinois. She campaigned for him when he sought the presidency in 2008.

Pennsylvania is a state Obama won in his 2008 and 2012 presidential races, but Trump won in 2016. Biden narrowly carried it in 2020 and the state is shaping up to be one of the most closely contested in this year’s race.

Trump was in the eastern part of the state Wednesday for back-to-back rallies in Scranton and Reading. He also campaigned in eastern Pennsylvania over the weekend when he returned to Butler, where he was shot in July as he survived an assassination attempt.

Obama’s appearance at the University of Pittsburgh was also aimed to bolster the reelection campaign of Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey, who is being challenged by Trump-endorsed Republican David McCormick.

Former President Barack Obama greets attendees after speaking at a campaign rally supporting Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, at the University of Pittsburgh's Fitzgerald Field House in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Matt Freed)

Former President Barack Obama greets attendees before speaking at a campaign rally supporting Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, at the University of Pittsburgh's Fitzgerald Field House in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Matt Freed)

Former President Barack Obama speaks during a campaign rally supporting Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, at the University of Pittsburgh's Fitzgerald Field House in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Matt Freed)

Former President Barack Obama speaks during a campaign rally supporting Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, at the University of Pittsburgh's Fitzgerald Field House in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Matt Freed)

Former President Barack Obama greets attendees after speaking at a campaign rally supporting Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, at the University of Pittsburgh's Fitzgerald Field House in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Matt Freed)

Former President Barack Obama speaks during a campaign rally supporting Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, at the University of Pittsburgh's Fitzgerald Field House in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Matt Freed)

LAS VEGAS (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris and the White House criticized Donald Trump for his attacks on the federal response to Hurricanes Helene and Milton and suggested he was wrongly trying to turn the deadly storms to his political advantage.

Attending a town hall sponsored by Univision in Las Vegas, Harris was asked about complaints that federal officials have bungled disaster recovery efforts. She responded, “In this crisis — like in so many issues that affect the people of our country — I think it so important that leadership recognizes the dignity” to which people are entitled.

“I have to stress that this is not a time for people to play politics," Harris added.

Those comments came after the former president spoke at the Detroit Economic Club, offering sympathy to people affected by Hurricanes Helene and Milton, the latter of which came ashore in Florida Wednesday night. But Trump also suggested that the Biden administration’s response had been lacking, particularly in North Carolina after Helene.

“They’ve let those people suffer unjustly,” said Trump, who has for several days promoted falsehoods about the federal response.

Harris virtually attended a briefing, held in the White House Situation Room with President Joe Biden, on emergency efforts in Milton’s wake. In subsequent comments to reporters, Biden slammed Trump and his supporters for spreading misinformation about federal assistance available to victims.

“They’re being so damn un-American with the way they’re talking about this stuff,” Biden said, then adding directly to Trump: "Get a life, man. Help these people.”

Despite the storm, Trump and Harris are both visiting key swing states strategically, trying to increase support with key voting blocs who could decide an election expected to be exceedingly close.

In Michigan, where he's looking to appeal primarily to blue-collar voters, Trump took a swipe at the city he happened to be campaigning in, suggesting that Detroit was “a mess.”

“Our whole country will end up being like Detroit if she’s your president," he said of Harris. “You’re going to have a mess on your hands.”

Harris responded that Trump "yet again has trashed another great American city when he was in Detroit, which is just a further piece of evidence on a very long list of why he is unfit to be president of the United States.”

The former president used his appearance at the Detroit Economic Club to echo core themes from his 2016 campaign, saying some other countries, especially China, are ripping the U.S. off and taking manufacturing business away. Trump said powerful companies have “raped” the United States.

“They’ve been screwing us for so many years that we’re allowed to get some of that back,” Trump said about charging tariffs from countries.

Economists warn Trump’s proposed tariffs would drive up consumer costs. Trump has also claimed, without providing specifics, that he can use tariffs to reduce the U.S. budget deficit and pay for an expansion of childcare funding, even as he proposes other ideas without saying how he would replace the lost funding.

But the former president seemed to not understand the difference between the budget deficit and trade imbalances, conflating the two different economic measures as essentially being the same thing.

He noted that the federal government has nearly $36 trillion in total debt, a byproduct of the annual borrowing needed to cover the gap between tax revenues and government spending. Except Trump then seemed to indicate that the debt was a byproduct of the trade deficit with China — which is a separate issue that reflects the difference between how much a country exports and how much it imports.

“We have $36 trillion in debt,” Trump said. “For years and years and years, we’ve been accumulating. We’d have these deficits that are monstrous. We had 5,6,7 $800 billion deficit with China.”

He also claimed that “we had the highest job numbers in my administration,” but that isn’t true any longer. The unemployment rate fell slightly lower under Biden — to 3.4% early last year, the lowest in a half-century, below 3.5% before the pandemic under Trump.

Harris held a rally near Phoenix after participating in the town hall for the Spanish-language network Univision. She's looking to increase support among Hispanic voters, especially men.

Her campaign began a group this week known as “Hombres con Harris” — Spanish for “Men for Harris” — that is planning to hold events at Latino-owned small businesses, union halls, barbecues and community events until Election Day.

At Univision's “Latinos Ask, Kamala Harris Responds” event, Ivett Castillo, 40 and a Las Vegas resident, told Harris that she’s an American citizen born to two Mexican parents and that her mother died six weeks ago. She cried as she asked the vice president about “plans to support that subgroup of immigrants here their whole lives and who live and die in the shadows.” When the town hall ended, Harris went over and clasped hands with Castillo, whose face was still streaked with tears.

In response to her question, Harris noted that Biden sent a bill to Congress on his first day in office seeking to create pathways to U.S. citizenship for many people in the country illegally that was never considered.

Unauthorized border crossings hit record highs during the Biden administration before declining this year after the president issued an executive order restricting asylum claims.

Another audience member asked Harris to explain how she replaced Biden on the Democratic ticket, prompting her to respond, “President Biden made a decision that I think history will show was probably one of the most courageous a president could make."

She said Biden “put country before personal interest” and “urged me to run.”

Hispanic voters are about evenly split on whether to trust Harris or Trump to do a better job handling the economy, but they give the former president an edge on handling immigration. Hispanic women are more likely to trust Harris to better handle the economy and immigration, and Hispanic men are more likely to trust Trump on both issues, according to polling from The Associated Press and the NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.

Later, in Arizona, Harris praised the late Republican Arizona Sen. John McCain for defying his party and voting to preserve the Obama administration's signature health care law. That drew extended cheers while people in the crowd made thumbs-down gestures to signify McCain's opposition to the GOP effort to repeal it.

“It was late, late, late in the night and they were trying to get rid of the Affordable Care Act again,” Harris recalled of the Senate vote. “And the late, great John McCain, the great American war hero ... said: 'No you don't. No you don't. No you don't.'”

Harris also deviated from her usual campaign speech to urge Arizonans to vote in a state referendum to safeguard abortion rights and talked about preserving tribal rights and responsible water policy.

“I promise you as president I will continue to invest in drought resilience," Harris said.

Volmert reported from Detroit. Weissert reported from Washington. Associated Press writers Christopher Rugaber, Josh Boak and Linley Sanders in Washington, Anna Johnson in Chandler, Arizona, and Adriana Gomez Licon in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, contributed to this report.

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, on the Gila River Indian Community reservation in Chandler, Ariz. (AP Photo/Matt York)

The crowd reacts as Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, on the Gila River Indian Community reservation in Chandler, Ariz. (AP Photo/Matt York)

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, on the Gila River Indian Community reservation in Chandler, Ariz. (AP Photo/Matt York)

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks during a Town Hall event hosted by Univision, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, at the University of Nevada Las Vegas. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks as moderator Enrique Acevedo listens during a Town Hall event hosted by Univision, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, at the University of Nevada Las Vegas. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks at a meeting of the Detroit Economic Club, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, in Detroit. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks during a Town Hall event hosted by Univision, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, at the University of Nevada Las Vegas. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

President Joe Biden turns to respond to a question about former President Donald Trump following an update on the impact and the ongoing response to Hurricane Milton, in the South Court Auditorium on the White House complex in Washington, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump listens as he answers questions at a meeting of the Detroit Economic Club, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, in Detroit. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks during a Town Hall event hosted by Univision, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, at the University of Nevada Las Vegas. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump arrives to speak at a meeting of the Detroit Economic Club, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, in Detroit. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks during a Town Hall event hosted by Univision, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, at the University of Nevada Las Vegas. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris waves as she boards Air Force Two at LaGuardia International Airport, Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)

Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump gestures at a campaign rally at the Santander Arena, Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024, in Reading, Pa. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)