But with us right now to talk about what this means to the everyday person and how it can figure into a campaign, and a winning one for Donald Trump, is Donald Trump's co-manager, campaign manager Chris LaCivita and GOP political strategist. Chris, welcome back. Thanks for having me.
Good to be back. All right, so Chris, tell me the game plan to beat Kamala Harris. This is not totally a surprise to you, even though at the RNC it looked like since the assassination attempt that maybe Joe Biden was going to weather the storm.
He didn't. So Harris has been in for a few weeks now. What's the game plan for victory?
You know, it's pretty simple, but you're right. You know, after the attempted assassination of the president and then the RNC convention, which was fantastic, highlighting all of the issues and the differences between essentially Republicans and Democrats. When you talk about inflation and the border and et cetera, the Democrats, you know, essentially from our perspective, you know, instituted a coup. And be that as it may, they substituted, they gave, you know, obviously Kamala Harris is now the nominee. She's picked, you know, a governor from Minnesota, Waltz, who's just, I mean, I couldn't even begin to figure out where he is on the spectrum as it relates to how liberal he is. But the press has given her a free ride.
I mean, and everybody knows that. It's been, you know, a few weeks without her answering questions. She went weeks without even having to answer questions.
So gave her a bit of a honeymoon. They're now going into the Democratic convention where, you know, they're going to try and put on the show. But look, it's really it's pretty simple that this morning, you know, the CPI came out and the question that you have to ask yourself really is, are you paying more or less for things now than you did four years ago? And that's perhaps the singular biggest contrast that exists between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris, which is the state of the economy. And despite COVID and everything else that was thrown in President Trump's way, you know, he built the world's greatest economy, then COVID wrecked it, then he did it again. And so, you know, that's the single biggest issue contrast. When you think about it, Brian, since Harris has been vice president, gas is up 51 percent, electricity 32 percent, fuel oil 50 percent, airfare 23 percent, hotels 51 percent, food, groceries over 21 percent, baby food 30 percent.
I mean, rent 22 percent. So, you know, things have exploded in cost. And, you know, while you have the Harris campaign and while you have the Main Street media gaslighting the American people saying, oh, it's fine, everything's fine. Americans are hurting and they know that. And Americans are smarter than, you know, the Democrats give them credit for.
They're not going to be played. We've laid out, I think, a pretty comprehensive economic plan. And when you think about it, that was reinforced by the fact that, you know, the first policy proposal that Kamala Harris came out with was to basically steal Donald Trump's plan of no taxing on tips. How do you feel about that? Because now they're now Joe Biden's for it, too, and they might even offer his legislation, Chris. Well, I mean, look, here's the thing. Good politics makes good policy. And the Democrats are so desperate to avoid any responsibility for what they've created that they're really they're they're literally willing to recast themselves in a very cynical attempt to fool voters.
And it's, you know, it's just up to us to make sure that those they're just not bought. I mean, you have to remember when President Trump announced this issue in June in Vegas, it was one hundred and nine degrees that day. I remember it was yesterday and he was roundly criticized by the press. You know, CBS News ran this headline, which was it will cost, you know, when Republicans want to cut taxes, that's the only time the Democrats in the press talk about how much it'll cost. Something costs, you know, never mind the fact that that's the cost to the refund to the American people. But so roundly criticized the proposal. And, you know, it's too expensive. It's it's it's it's a joke.
It doesn't make a difference. You know, now all of a sudden it's the greatest thing since sliced bread. That's a very cynical attempt to reshape and reformat things.
Again, it's up to us to make sure that people don't buy it. Gotcha. So Chris Lassa Vida, our guest. Chris, here's what Nikki Haley was on.
She doesn't do much these days, but she was on with a special report last night. Advice to you guys. Cut to. I want this campaign to win, but the campaign is not going to win talking about crowd sizes. It's not going to win talking about what race Kamala Harris is. It's not going to win talking about whether she's dumb.
It's not. You can't win on those things. The American people are smart.
Treat them like they're smart. Do you think the campaign is missing the mark on those things? I think the campaign needs to focus. That's the main thing. Look, this is a winnable election, but you need to focus your your thought about that.
Is she right? Well, look, here's the thing. If you look at what the national media decides it's going to talk about. Right. And decide what they want to emphasize. That's you know, they'll pull that stuff out from five years ago, four years ago, three years ago.
I mean, it's it's a it's a losing battle. You know, when the president did his press conference at Marlargo a little over a week ago and literally stood in front of the press, the entire press for an hour and took every conceivable question. None of those answers on the vast majority of those questions have have ever been talked about. I mean, he talked about inflation. He talked about where we are in the world stage. So, I mean, look, the focus of the campaign has always been about putting Americans in a better position to be successful.
And it's going to continue to be that way. And again, we're focusing on these key issues of, you know, illegal immigration. You know, I mean, Kamala Harris comes out yesterday, last night by some aid, some campaign person, and says she's no longer for Medicare for all.
Yes. But it's just that's just a joke, because there's a ton of film with her talking about that's her number one policy proposal. So, again, but she's going to say she evolved. Chris, Chris, Lesavita, you know, she's going to say she evolved on that. She evolved on fracking.
She's about to do that Friday. I'll give her first economic speech. So if she says she evolved on that, what is your what's your counterpunch? Well, the counterpunch is can you believe anything she says? Because for years up to now, she's espoused these positions. I mean, she believes in giving Social Security benefits to illegal aliens. Now, if you're a recipient of Social Security and you know how dire the trust fund is, are you willing? And are you going to trust that Kamala Harris isn't going to bankrupt Social Security and Medicare by giving it away to illegals?
That's an awful big leap for a lot of people. So you've got to walk away from Bidenomics. You can't have you can't stand by Bidenomics at the same time, walk away from it while you're still in the administration. It seems bizarre.
Bidenomics is working, according to Kamala Harris. The Daily Mail says this. It says insider tells say that Trump behind the scenes of Mar-a-Lago is upset about picking J.D. Vance, that he has regrets about it. Would you say is there any accuracy to that? No, zero, none. I generally don't refer to British newspapers as my first place of information. I'll say that. Number one, the number two.
No, it's it's 100 percent not true. They talk two, three times a day. At least J.D. has been fantastic in terms of laying the wood, the waltz and to Kamala Harris. He's been out campaigning. He's been a great partner.
And no, there's it's just it's fake news. I think he was brilliant over the weekend on three network shows. Here's Peter Navarro fresh out of prison. Cut 15. Trump doesn't need feast now. He needs votes in the current rally formula is simply not sufficiently focused on the very stark policy differences, policy differences between him and Kamala Harris that will swing voters in key battleground states. So he says your rally formula isn't working. Right. Well, I mean, look, again, it's about what we talk about and what the focus is on the issues. I mean, a lot of people can say a lot of different things, but we're about pushing very specific messages.
Those messages Peter's right about about pushing policy differences. That's that's the number one goal of the president's the number one goal of the campaign. And we'll take every opportunity we can to to actually do that. Plus, you know, we also can't forget that, you know, this is also a game of turnout. And, you know, we have to make sure that our people are motivated. We've been engaged in efforts across the country with T47 and our grassroots operations to do that. And, you know, look, it's August, it's the middle of August and the Democrats swapped out their nominee and they put in somebody else who's never received a vote for president, who's never really been tested.
And, you know, we have plenty of time and we're in a very good position. So interesting because now you have the DNC coming up and traditionally and you've been doing this for a long time, but traditionally the other party goes kind of dark. But you only have 80 days and you just mentioned all the unique challenges. What is the strategy during the DNC where they're just going to bash Trump all day? He didn't love it in 2016. I knew that. And now he's not going to love it now. What's your thought? Are you going to keep him from watching it?
And what is your thought from how do you get some press during that time? Do you even try? Well, first of all, you know, you don't you don't go to Donald Trump and say, don't watch the I mean, the news. I mean, don't watch the Democratic convention. That's just that would never enter into the conversation. And besides, you know, people forget this is a guy who has built a very big, a very successful worldwide brand.
So, you know, we value all of those things. But but this much I will tell you, we will not give the left one inch. We're not going to give them one minute. We're not going to give them one inch.
We're not going to give them one second of free time. We're going to take advantage of every opportunity that we can create to ensure the American people know the differences and the vital differences between, you know, Donald Trump's campaign and President Trump and Kamala Harris and the leftist Democrats, because the fate of the country we truly believe hangs in the balance. So what will you do, Chris?
Will you do? Do you have rallies planned? The election's over. Oh, we've got a battle plan.
And I'm not going to sit and communicate it to the world today. But but but it's a very aggressive plan that puts us in a position to drive what we need to. I mean, look, if we spend the next week, spend the next two weeks talking about, you know, the differences in the price of gasoline, bread, food, you know, these types of things. And people have a clear and distinct understanding that if they vote for Kamala Harris, open borders becomes basic standard policy.
The rise in crime continues to stay the same. You know, people are going to start worrying about personal security, national security and their economic security. And that's what this is about. Amy Walter of The Cook Report says Harris is now leading or tied with Trump in six of the seven swing states. Does he do your polling say the same thing?
No. And as a matter of fact, you know, the the the swing state polling, we still have an advantage in the Electoral College. The map still does not favor. We still have over 20 different paths to get to 270. She's got two or three. And so and understand that that in large part, they're trying to redefine Kamala Harris as as this new person who just showed up on the scene. And we have 12 years of information, 12 years of footage of her talking about eliminating Medicaid and Medicare, essentially giving a legal free benefits, taxpayer funded benefits from health care to to schooling.
And then, of course, her record on crime, which is abysmal. So, you know, we were very confident in the plan that we have laid out. So I think it was about a week ago. It looks like President Trump has really ticked off at Brian Kemp again. I guess he was upset at Mrs. Kemp to since that time, I saw that Lindsey Graham talked to him and he came out and he said, I'm going to help how I can. But the two aren't talking. And Donald Trump says, I don't know if it's salvageable.
You need Georgia. Kemp's successful governor. What can you do to bring them together? Or do you not think the relationship is salvageable?
Well, I mean, I don't get into this level of specifics. I just know this that, you know, the camp, the campaign, the president very much focused on winning Georgia camp very much wanting to win Georgia. And so I think having the common bond of wanting to win in November is stronger than anything. We have a great organization down there and we have some great grassroots leaders. I mean, how we've got tens of thousands of diehard Trump supporters that are knocking on doors and doing those key things. So, you know, and actually, Brian, they actually do a lot of work with certain elements of the Brian Kemp Governor Kemp's team. So, I mean, our focus has been really the nuts and bolts aspect of campaigning. We have a very different operation down there fueled by a MAGA nation in the state of Georgia.
And so we accept help and assistance from anybody. So, you know, we'll be going back down there. We've been on TV down there for a while. You know, I'm very, very bullish in Georgia. Well, I'll tell you what. Donald Trump's got a Marine who's got his back. And I know you guys are going to fight through the finish.
It's a new challenge, but you've been training your whole life for new challenges. It's great seeing you, Chris. Thanks for the time. I know our audience really appreciates it. I know you don't do much, so we enjoy it. Thanks. Take care. Talk to you soon.
