Former President Donald Trump's scheduled visit to the Bronx on Thursday is a "very smart" move and "bad for the psychology of the [President Joe] Biden campaign," said presidential historian Craig Shirley on Newsmax.
Trump will campaign in one of the most Democratic counties in the nation Thursday, holding a rally in the South Bronx to woo minority voters days before a Manhattan jury will begin deliberations on whether to convict him of felony charges in his criminal business records trial.
The Bronx rally will be Trump's first event open to the general public as he insists he is making a play to win an overwhelmingly Democratic state that hasn't backed a Republican for president since Ronald Reagan in 1984.
Besides creating a spectacle of rally-goers and protesters, the rally also allows Trump to highlight what he argues are advantages on economic and immigration issues that could cut into key Democratic voting blocs.
"It's good for the psychology of his campaign. It reshuffles the deck. It's bad for the psychology of the Biden campaign. It not only causes him sleepless nights, but nap-less afternoons," Shirley said during an appearance on "Newsline."
"This is all good for Donald Trump. And it's all bad for Joe Biden. I can't think of anything that would make it admirable for Biden at all," he said. "The history of this is that Jimmy Carter went there in 1977 and promised all sorts of federal law and all sorts of goodies and handouts.
"And then he failed to follow through and the South Bronx just sank deeper into despair. So, Ronald Reagan went there right after his convention in 1980 to showcase the failures of the Carter administration.
"It didn't quite go according to plan, but it was still very good for Reagan to do it because it kept him on offense and it and put Carter on defense, as it will be with Trump tonight, it helps to reshuffle the deck and keep things focused on what he wants to focus them on."
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
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