Trump focuses on immigration, crime in first-ever rally in Philadelphia

What questions do you have about the 2024 elections? What major issues do you want candidates to address? Let us know.

Former President Donald Trump addressed immigration, crime and the economy at a rally in  Philadelphia on Saturday night.

It was Trump’s first rally in the City of Brotherly Love, in the crucial swing state of Pennsylvania. Trump carried the state in 2016 by less than 1 % point. In 2020, Biden won the state by a little more than 1% point.

Several thousand Trump supporters cheered him at Temple University’s Liacouras Center, where Trump began his speech referencing his time as a student at University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business, saying he “like[s]” the city. “Under Biden,” the city has experienced “bloodshed and crime,” Trump said.

“In the Trump administration, we’re going to bring law and order and safety back to our streets,” he said. “We’re going to bring success back to our schools, we’re going to bring prosperity back to our forgotten communities. And we’re going to liberate our once great cities and make Philadelphia better and more beautiful than ever before.”

A key focus of his speech was “migrant crime.” Trump said he would be tougher on immigration than Biden and was met with cheers when he told the crowd migrant workers were taking away jobs from Black and Latino Americans.

“On day one, I will seal the border,” Trump said, suggesting he would “rip up” Biden’s recent executive order protecting the approximately 500,000 number of undocumented immigrants who are married to U.S. citizens from deportation. Biden also issued an executive order in early June that restricts asylum claims when the weekly average of people crossing the border each day exceeds 2,500.

The former president painted a bleak picture of international politics.

“Our border is overrun, inflation is raging. Crime is out of control. Europe is in chaos. The Middle East is exploding. Iran is emboldened. China is on the march, and this horrible, horrible president is dragging us toward World War III,” Trump said. “We’re going to be in World War III soon.”

Trump also took on topics such as vaccine and mask mandates and critical race theory in schools, emphasizing his opposition to each. He made personal digs at Philly native and CNN anchor Jake Tapper, who will co-moderate the first presidential debate on June 27. Trump also spoke against the inclusion of transgender athletes in women’s sports.

The former president weighed in on the Pa. U.S. Senate race, throwing his support behind Republican candidate Dave McCormick, who is attempting to unseat incumbent Democrat Sen. Bob Casey.

“You have my total support and my total endorsement, and you got to win, Dave McCormick,” Trump said, calling him a “seventh-generation Pennsylvanian” and inviting McCormick on  stage. McCormick returned the favor by endorsing Trump.

“We need new leadership,” McCormick said. “We need a new president in the White House that’s going to get our country back on track.”

Earlier in the evening, protesters gathered on the opposite side of Broad Street, waving Biden-Harris signs. Chants of “Biden, Biden” on one side of the street were met with chants of “USA” from Trump supporters on the other side. An anti-Trump protester with a Gritty mask held a sign reading, “No Tyrants! No Dictators! Only Gritty.”

Gregory Brown, Philly resident and member of Local 332, said Trump has a right to speak in Philly — but he doesn’t want to see him in the White House again.

“You know what he said, if he loses, there’s going to be bloodshed,” Brown said. “So we don’t need no president like that.”

Andrea Chapman, a Philadelphia resident, came out to protest Trump.

“He’s a convicted felon…We want him to go to the big house and not the White House in 2025,” she said.

Outside the venue, Jeffrey “Fredo” Smith of South Carolina was selling Trump merchandise.

“Making a dollar, making new friends, supporting my president, life is good,” Smith said. He said he supports Trump because as president, he “looked out for the HBCUs” while in office.

Caleb Wilson, from Tioga County, Pennsylvania, came down to the rally with friends Braeden Heverly and Brittany Stoddard.

“I like what he stands for, he’s what America needs, he’s a businessman and we’re so far in the hole with debt in other countries, we need a businessman to get in there to get us back out. That’s why I support him,” Wilson said.

Courting the Black Vote

The Trump campaign announced its Black Voters for Trump Coalition last week, shortly after opening a Latino Americans for Trump office in Reading, Pa.

The choice of North Philly for Saturday’s rally aimed to woo Black voters displeased with the current president. The district, a predominantly Black but diverse neighborhood, boasts a legacy of rearing Black civil rights leaders such as Cecil B. Moore and has been the historical home to prominent Black doctors, pastors, architects, small business owners and politicians since the early 1900s.

Biden won 92% of the Black vote in 2020. But, recent polling shows only 50% of Black voters will vote for him if the election were held today. Meanwhile, Trump’s share has gone up.

“That’s a big shift,” U.S. Representative Dan Meuser, who represents Pennsylvania’s 9th Congressional District, told WHYY News before giving a speech at the rally. “And with younger African Americans, it’s even better. And the numbers are quite similar with Latino Americans. So look, we’ve got a lot of momentum.”

Meuser argues that Black voters are frustrated with the same issues as other voters.

“Crime is up, inflation is up, gasoline prices are up — nothing’s being improved,” he said. “So people say, Joe Biden’s all talk and no action. And they want to see a course change.”

State Representative Malcolm Kenyatta, however, says he believes his constituents will come out for Biden.

“He is coming to my district to lie, not because he’s trying to court Black voters, but actually because he has no respect for Black voters and for our intelligence,” Kenyatta, who represents North Philly, told WHYY News.

Kenyatta said voters will remember Trump’s “racist” ways — how he questioned former President Barack Obama’s citizenship and the Department of Justice’s lawsuit alleging Trump’s real estate company refused to rent to Black residents in New York.