Donald Trump's fixation on his belief that the 2024 presidential election will be "stolen" from him has led his campaign to build up an army of so-called poll watchers that has Republicans at the local level worried may actually hurt his election prospects.
According to a new report from Axios, there are growing GOP worries that their get-out-the-vote efforts will be crippled by what Trump's people call "election integrity" efforts.
As Sophia Cai wrote for Axios, "Some Republicans worry that Trump's focus on preventing a 'rigged' election has hurt the party's ground game, the get-out-the-vote operations that can be crucial in an election as close as this one."
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Noting Trump now faces "an invigorated Democratic ticket" after President Joe Biden stepped aside and Vice President Kamala Harris has assumed the mantle of Democratic presidential nominee, the Axios report also pointed out that the Harris campaign already has a leg up on volunteers dedicated to getting non-Trump voters to the polls.
"Harris' team says 330,000 people have worked as volunteers since she announced her campaign last month," the report states before adding that, in contrast, Trump's campaign "has 14,000 trained volunteers or 'Trump Force 47 Captains' in battleground states."
Asked about the difference in ground game strategy, Trump campaign political director James Blair blew off the Democrat's army of volunteers, telling Axios, their claim is "fake numbers on a spreadsheet."
Republican accountability group American Bridge 21st Century has said Trump's policies relate not to election integrity but to his "obsession" with a lost election.
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