'Counterproductive': Trump advisor admits 'off message' speeches could cost him election

Former President Donald Trump isn't doing himself any favors with his increasingly confused and rambling stump speeches in the final stretch of the campaign.

That's according to Trump advisor and CNN commentator David Urban, who told the New York Times that the ex-president may be actually helping to motivate Vice President Kamala Harris' supporters to come out in greater numbers. This could pose an especially significant problem in major battleground states like Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

“When he’s good, he’s great, and when he’s off message, he’s not so great,” Urban told the Times. “I don’t think anyone is really changing their mind at this point, but when he distracts from his biggest, broadest messaging, it’s counterproductive because the Harris campaign uses it to turn out their voters.”

Urban isn't the only member of Trump's team cautioning him against going off-script. One recent example of Trump's more unhinged behavior include earlier this week, when he suddenly ended the Q&A portion of a town hall event in favor of dancing onstage to his campaign playlist for nearly 40 minutes. He also made headlines when responding to a question about foreign election interference only to pivot to "the enemy from within," and even suggesting he would deploy the U.S. military against his political opponents.

In a back-and-forth with Bloomberg editor-in-chief John Micklethwait at the Chicago Economic Club, Trump continued his pattern of nonsensical responses to direct questions. When Micklethwait asked the ex-president if he wanted to break up Google, Trump talked about voter rolls in Virginia. Trump also suddenly started talking about French President Emmanuel Macron in the middle of talking about global reserve currency. When Micklethwait pointed out Trump's inability to stay on-topic, the 2024 GOP presidential nominee defended his speaking style by saying: "It's called the weave."

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Trump appears to be actively resisting calls from his allies to rein in his more extreme rhetoric. Last week, Trump tweeted a promise to invoke an 18th century law that allows for the detention of legal immigrants based solely on their country of birth, without trial. Rolling Stone reported that when advisors urged him to "tone down" his anti-migrant rhetoric, Trump replied: "That's how you lose."

Times reporters Michael C. Bender and Taylor Robinson recounted one recent rally in which Trump deviated from his anti-migrant speech to "tell one quick story" about a vehicle manufacturing plant in Mexico. But one minute into that story, he had abandoned it and started criticizing President Joe Biden as "cognitively repaired" (rather than "cognitively impaired").

The former president's campaign may be motivated by a desire to keep their candidate out of the spotlight as much as possible, as he has cancelled multiple interviews and public events despite voters heading to the polls in less than two weeks. Just this week, Trump backed out of interviews with CNBC and NBC News — which came after he became the first presidential candidate in decades to back out of an interview with CBS' 60 Minutes.

Trump has continued to refused to debate Harris again after their September 10 meeting in Pennsylvania. A scheduled CNN debate next week has instead become a town hall event for Harris. And while Harris has released her medical records, Trump continues to keep his hidden from the public.

Earlier today, Trump even cancelled a keynote speech at a National Rifle Association event in Savannah, Georgia, which is a must-win battleground state that swung from Trump to Biden between 2016 and 2020. Trump gave no explanation for the abrupt decision to cancel other than a "campaign scheduling conflict."

Click here to read the Times' report in its entirety (subscription required).