Vice President Kamala Harris drew a bigger crowd than Donald Trump as both presidential candidates appeared for campaign events in Pennsylvania on Monday.
Pennsylvania, with its 19 Electoral College votes, is one of the most vital swing states of the 2024 election. Both the Republican and Democratic candidates’ clearest paths to 270 Electoral College votes involve winning The Keystone State in November.
Harris spoke at a rally at the Erie Insurance Arena in northwestern Pennsylvania the same day Trump took part in a town hall moderated by South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem in suburban Philadelphia. Photos from the scenes of both events appeared to indicate more people were in attendance at the vice president’s event, though Trump’s town hall did take place in a smaller venue.
Gus Pine, Erie Events’ executive director, told the Erie Times-News that “5,400 patrons is our capacity for this set up,” ahead of Harris’ appearance, and that he expected the venue to be full. In comparison, Trump’s town hall was hosted in the smaller venue of the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center and Fairgrounds in Oaks, where the largest event room has a capacity of just over 3,000.
Newsweek has contacted Trump’s and Harris’ campaign teams for comment via email.
The former president has repeatedly cited the size of the crowds at his campaign events as proof of his popularity. Trump has often exaggerated the numbers of those in attendance by tens of thousands.
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For his recent rally in Coachella Valley, California, the former president appeared to suggest it was attended by around 100,000 people, but local paper Desert Sun reported that the event was limited to a maximum capacity of 15,000 people by Riverside County.
“Maybe Trump doesn’t care about crowd sizes anymore, but Harris here has drawn a crowd twice to three times what Trump got here in Erie (he was at a much smaller venue) two weeks ago,” S.V. Dáte, senior White House correspondent at the Huffington Post, posted on X, formerly Twitter.
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Trump appeared in Erie on September 29 for an indoor rally at the Bayfront Convention Center, where the main room holds a maximum of 4,000 people.
Trump reportedly stopped holding large outdoor rallies for safety reasons following the assassination attempt against him at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13, but he resumed in August.
In September, Trump told the Erie crowd that he had to move his scheduled outdoor rally in Wisconsin the previous day to a smaller indoor venue because the Secret Service did not have the manpower to secure the event as the United Nations General Assembly meeting was taking place in New York.
After his return to Butler, Pennsylvania, on October 9, he said the rally was attended by around 100,000 people. Newsweek found that, based on crowd-mapping software and expert analysis, the figure may have been closer to around 30,000.
Trump’s town hall in Oaks on Monday was interrupted twice by medical emergencies in the crowd.
“Doctor, please. Doctor. Thank you very much,” he said at one point through the microphone. “We have incredible people. They come here hours before and it’s a little hot.”
Minutes later, the crowd called for a “medic,” causing Trump to stop speaking once again.
The former president then said he wouldn’t be taking any more questions and instead told his team to play music as he at times danced on stage for around 30 minutes.
“To lighten the mood, President Trump turned the town hall into an impromptu concert and the crowd loved it,” Karoline Leavitt, Trump’s campaign press secretary told ABC News. “The room was full of joy.”
At her Erie event Monday night, Harris questioned Trump’s mental cognizance, describing her rival as “unstable” and “unhinged.”
“Donald Trump is increasingly unstable and unhinged, and he is out for unchecked power, that is what he is looking for. He wants to send the military after American citizens,” she said.
She played a 30-second clip of Trump repeatedly discussing “the enemy from within” and how they should be jailed or “handled” by the National Guard or military.
“He considers anyone who doesn’t support him or who will not bend to his will, an enemy of our country,” Harris said.
