‘These next 10 days will matter for decades.’ Trump, Obama push Florida to early vote

Determined to continue banking votes before Election Day in the nation’s biggest battleground, President Donald Trump and Democratic nominee Joe Biden deployed their best closers Saturday to South Florida.

Biden sent former President Barack Obama to Florida International University’s North Miami campus, where America’s first and only Black president told a diverse crowd that “what we do over these next 10 days will matter for decades to come.” And Trump sent, well, himself to West Palm Beach, where he cast a ballot in person for the first time since registering to vote in Florida one year ago.

“I voted for a guy named Trump,” he said, before leaving in a motorcade for the airport.

The dueling appearances by the United States’ 44th and 45th presidents came on the first weekend of early voting in Florida, where around 5.5 million voters had already cast ballots by the time Obama finished his 45-minute speech. That pace puts Floridians on track to easily surpass the 6.5 million ballots cast early and by mail in the entirety of the 2016 election.

But in an election held during a pandemic, neither side intends to ease up before Election Day. And with Democrats having built a massive lead over Republicans through vote-by-mail, Trump sought Saturday to spur his supporters to continue showing up over the final nine days of early voting by doing so himself.

Trump cast his ballot at the Palm Beach County main library in West Palm Beach at around 10 a.m. Trump voted alone in a private room at the library, according to White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany. Outside, Trump supporters waved flags and chanted, hoping to catch glimpse of the president.

He emerged from his private voting room around 10:17 a.m. With library stacks behind him, he quickly stopped to tell reporters he felt more secure voting in person, as opposed to mailing in his ballot as he did in March and August.

“It was a very secure vote,” said Trump, who broadcast his arrival at the library to crowds at early voting locations in Miami-Dade, Naples, Jacksonville, Pensacola and Tampa. Large screens streamed the moments after Trump’s vote. “Everything was perfect.”

Outside the Westchester Regional Library in West Miami-Dade County, about 50 people gathered on the lawn of Francisco Human Rights Park to watch Trump address reporters after voting. More than 12,000 people had already voted at the Westchester library, the busiest early voting center in Miami-Dade County.

Eduardo Jorge, who went to vote Saturday at the library with his wife, said he wanted to see his vote being counted in person because he doesn’t trust vote-by-mail, a process the president has repeatedly sought to brand as untrustworthy.

“I know there’s a lot of tricky stuff with the vote-by-mail, that’s why I don’t trust it,” said Jorge, 56, who is Cuban American.

Trump’s inaccurate characterizations of mail voting, though, don’t appear to have diminished the party’s mail voting numbers. Florida Republicans set a party record Saturday for number of mail ballots cast in an election at more than 1.1 million, topping their 2016 numbers with 10 days still to go before Election Day.

Republicans have simply continued to prefer to vote in person, distinguishing them from Democrats and leading Republicans for the first time to post marked advantages over Democrats in early, in-person voting numbers. While nearly 600,000 more Democrats than Republicans had cast mail ballots through Saturday evening, around 220,000 more Republicans than Democrats had voted in person.

Hoping to preserve as much of Democrats’ mail ballot lead ahead of Election Day, Biden, who was in Pennsylvania on Saturday, sent Obama to North Miami, where the former president slammed nearly every facet of the incumbent’s record during a rally held in the student parking lot of FIU’s Biscayne Bay campus.

Making his first speech in Miami-Dade County in two years, Obama made specific appeals to Florida’s diverse electorate by mentioning issues like socialism, Obamacare and the federal government’s Hurricane Maria response. But the biggest chunk of his 45-minute speech was devoted to an issue that affects every voter: Trump’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic.

“We literally left this White House a pandemic playbook to show them how to respond before a virus reached our shores,” Obama said, drawing honks from the crowd. “It must be lost along with the Republican healthcare plan.”

The pandemic has altered the state of campaigning across the country, and Obama’s Miami speech was no exception. Instead of applause, Obama was greeted with horn-honking from the 228 cars allowed on an open field in the middle of campus. Instead of a backdrop full of politicians and community leaders, Obama gave his remarks from an empty stage.

“We just saw the highest number of cases spike up yesterday,” Obama said, of COVID-19 infections nationally. “You think [Trump] would be ready for a response? He doesn’t have a plan. He doesn’t even acknowledge the reality.”

More than 16,000 Florida residents have died of COVID-19, according to the Florida Department of Health. The outbreak in Florida isn’t as severe now as it was in late July, but the number of positive cases has been rising somewhat in recent days, with 4,433 cases reported Saturday.

Before arriving at FIU, Obama stopped at a Biden-Harris field office in Miami Springs and spoke to a small crowd of Democratic organizers over a megaphone, saying, “If you bring Florida home, this thing’s over.” His stop at the small, majority Latino city was meant to motivate local campaign workers for Biden in communities where Trump’s campaign thinks they can find enough votes to win Florida on Election Day.

Obama also mentioned Florida’s policy of counting mail-in votes as they are received, meaning that the state could offer some clarity on Election Day once polls are closed.

“I won’t have to wait for the results,” Obama said. “I want to go to sleep knowing we’re going to have a president fighting on our behalf.”

At least some of the scattered crowd at FIU on Saturday had already voted. Bernice Fidelia-Morris, a Miami Shores Democrat who came to the U.S. from Haiti about 40 years ago, said she’s anxious to vote Trump out of office. She said she plans to vote Sunday at the Lemon City Branch Library.

“This particular president doesn’t care about people, doesn’t care about nothing but himself. It’s what’s in it for him,” said Fidelia-Morris, who worries about the future of her Obamacare insurance and Trump’s efforts to deport Haitians.

It also wasn’t a coincidence that the Democratic Party brought their biggest draw to majority Black North Miami. Black voter turnout in the state dropped from 74% in 2008 during Obama’s first run for president to 69% in 2016 when Hillary Clinton lost Florida to Trump by 112,000 votes.

Obama used one of his many Trump-related zingers to respond to a boast from the president, which he repeated at Thursday’s final presidential debate, that “not since Abraham Lincoln has anybody done what I’ve done for the Black community.”

“He loves talking about black unemployment, says he’s the best president for Black Americans since Abe Lincoln,” Obama said, with a smile and a shake of his head. “What?”

Angela D. Nelson, 64, drove to the rally in her black Hyundai Kona. A registered Democrat and member of the NAACP, said she’s “voting to get Trump out of office.”

“I’m proud of what we’re doing. I hope that we step up and stand for equal rights and justice,” said Nelson, a retired Miami-Dade public schools teacher who voted early Monday at the Miramar Branch Library in Broward County.

Biden is banking on Democrats to show up in high numbers to vote in person this weekend and next to counteract a wave of Republicans expected to crest on Election Day.

Obama made a number of Florida-specific appeals during his speech on Saturday.

He criticized Trump for trying to overturn Obamacare through the courts without offering a replacement, reminding Miami-Dade County voters that the area is particularly reliant on the 10-year-old law for increasing the number of families and children with health insurance.

“Miami-Dade has the highest enrollment of any county in Florida,” Obama said. “Florida has the highest enrollment of any state in America. Just this week Trump flat out said he hopes the Supreme court will take Obamacare away.”

And he also responded to ongoing Republican attacks that Biden is a socialist or a tool of the socialist left, attacks which are particularly aimed at Cuban-American voters and other Latinos in Miami-Dade. Polling suggests that Trump is in a position to do better with South Florida Latinos in 2020 than he did in 2016.

“Don’t fall for that garbage. Joe Biden is not a socialist,” Obama said. “He was a senator from Delaware. He was my vice president, I think folks would know if he was a secret socialist by now.”

The overarching message of Obama’s speech — that four more years of Trump would lead to worse healthcare outcomes in the midst of a pandemic — was reinforced by the 17-year-old who introduced him, Miami Northwestern senior George Pickens. Pickens, who is Black, lost his mother nine months ago to cancer and Obama mentioned him frequently throughout his speech.

“Personally, I’m tired of having a president who spends more time with Twitter than I do,” Pickens said.

Obama closed his remarks with an appeal for Floridians to vote early, and vote for Democrats, making a COVID-themed riff from his famous “Fired Up! Ready to go!” chant during his own campaign days.

“Honk if you’re fired up. Honk if you’re ready to go,” Obama said.

But Trump’s campaign said Obama’s visit won’t do anything to slow the steady march of Republicans to the polls.

“After President Trump’s clear victory in the debate Thursday night, sending Barack Obama to the Sunshine State will do nothing to stop President Trump’s looming re-election,” Trump Victory spokeswoman Emma Vaughn said.