Biden bashes Trump's leadership on pandemic, Trump attacks Biden on
trade
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[September 22, 2020]
By Trevor Hunnicutt and Jeff Mason
MANITOWOC, Wis./DAYTON, Ohio (Reuters) -
Democrat Joe Biden slammed U.S. President Donald Trump's handling of the
coronavirus pandemic and Trump criticized Biden's record on trade on
Monday as the White House contenders battled for votes in key Midwestern
battleground states.
With U.S. deaths from COVID-19 approaching 200,000, Biden said on a
campaign stop in Wisconsin that Trump "froze" when faced with the
enormous challenge posed by the health crisis and was not capable of the
leadership needed to confront it.
"He just wasn't up to it. He froze. He failed to act. He panicked,"
Biden said after meeting workers at an aluminum manufacturing plant in
Manitowoc, south of Green Bay.
Biden, who is trying to win back Wisconsin after Trump carried it
narrowly in 2016, made a direct appeal to blue-collar voters who
supported President Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012 but shifted to Trump.
"The simple truth is that Donald Trump ran for office saying he would
represent the forgotten men and women of this country – and then once in
office, he forgot them," Biden said.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2020/Sep/22/images/ads/current/graue_preowned_092120.png)
In Ohio, Trump criticized Biden's past support for free-trade deals that
he said had cost the state jobs and hurt the economy in the upper
Midwest.
"Joe Biden should not be asking for your support. He should be begging
for your forgiveness," Trump said.
He criticized Biden's past support for the North American Free Trade
Agreement, which has been replaced by a new pact under Trump, and the
Trans-Pacific Partnership, which Trump withdrew from in 2017 after he
took office.
"He betrayed you, he lied to you, he abused you. Which is why it's time
to retire Joe Biden," he said.
The two candidates' speeches marked a return to the themes that
dominated the race before the death on Friday of liberal Supreme Court
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, which has shifted the focus to the coming
battle over confirming her replacement.
Trump is moving quickly to fill Ginsburg's seat in hopes of cementing a
6-3 conservative majority on the court, a key priority for social
conservatives, before the Nov. 3 election.
The rallies were also a reminder of the importance of the two
battleground states. Polls show Biden leading by several points in
Wisconsin, mirroring his overall lead nationwide, and Trump ahead in
Ohio, which he won by 8 percentage points in 2016.
A new Reuters/Ipsos poll on Monday showed Biden leading Trump among
likely voters in Wisconsin, while the two are about even in
Pennsylvania, another battleground state.
Biden said in Wisconsin that Trump could have saved lives with a mask
mandate but continued to hold rallies without social distancing or
people wearing masks, and worried too much about spooking financial
markets.
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![](../images/092220pics/news_q33.jpg)
Democratic U.S. presidential nominee and former Vice President Joe
Biden speaks during a campaign speech in which he never removed his
mask for the duration of the speech, while discussing the death toll
from the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in the United
States exceeding 200,000 people, at the Wisconsin Aluminum Foundry
in Manitowoc, Wisconsin, U.S., September 21, 2020. REUTERS/Mark
Makela
![](../images/ads/current/fitzpatrick_lda_SPONSOR_2017.png)
'KEEPS HIS DISTANCE'
"He loves his rallies. But the next time he holds one, look closely.
Trump keeps his distance," he said. "He’s willing to let everyone in
that crowd risk their life. But not him."
In his last visit to the state, Biden spoke with Jacob Blake, the
Black man whose shooting by police in the city of Kenosha prompted
unrest.
This time, he visited largely white Manitowoc County, which
supported the former vice president and President Barack Obama when
they ran on the Democratic ticket in 2008.
The county backed Trump in 2016, helping deliver the state to a
Republican presidential candidate for the first time since 1984,
albeit with less than 1% of the vote.
Trump visited Wisconsin last week, announcing a new round of
coronavirus pandemic assistance to farmers of about $13 billion.
Biden has built a formidable financial advantage for the campaign's
final stretch after a massive fundraising haul in August. The
campaign and its party allies will report having $466 million in
cash at the end of August, while Trump's war chest stood at $325
million, according to officials from both sides.
Early voting, both in-person and by mail, has already begun in a
handful of states.
In Ohio, Trump returned to many of the economic themes that
dominated his re-election pitch prior to Ginsburg's death. He
promised the economy would bounce back strongly as the pandemic
fades, and criticized Biden's free-trade views.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2020/Sep/22/images/ads/current/LPL_small%201.gif)
"If Biden wins, China wins. If we win, Ohio wins," he said at an
election rally at the Dayton airport, the first of two appearances
in the state.
Earlier in the race, many Democrats had privately written Ohio off,
seeing it as firmly in Trump's grasp. But polls show a tight
contest, and Biden's campaign is now pursuing wins in an expanded
set of states.
On Monday, Biden's campaign said it would add Republican-leaning
Georgia and Iowa, both won easily by Trump in 2016 but also home to
competitive U.S. Senate races, to a list of 10 other states where it
is running paid advertisements.
(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt and Jeff Mason, additional reporting
by Joseph Ax and Andrea Shalal; Writing by John Whitesides; Editing
by Scott Malone, Andrea Ricci and Sonya Hepinstall)
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