Kamala Harris told a Michigan church on Sunday that God offers America a “divine plan strong enough to heal division”, while Donald Trump gave a speech in which he mused about reporters being shot and suggested that he “shouldn’t have left” the White House after his 2020 election loss.
The two US presidential election candidates took starkly different tones on the final Sunday of the campaign.
Less than 48 hours before election day, Ms Harris, the Democratic vice president, argued that Tuesday’s election offers voters the chance to reject “chaos, fear and hate”, while Mr Trump, the Republican former president, repeated lies about voter fraud to try to cast doubt on the integrity of the vote and suggested that the country was falling apart without him in office.
Some of his allies, notably former chief strategist Steve Bannon, have encouraged him to prematurely declare victory on Tuesday even if the race is too early to call.
That is what Mr Trump did four years ago, kicking off a process of fighting the election results that culminated in the January 6 2021, insurrection at the US Capitol.
Ms Harris was concentrating her Sunday in Michigan, beginning the day with a few hundred parishioners at Detroit’s Greater Emmanuel Institutional Church of God in Christ.
“I see a nation determined to turn the page on hate and division and chart a new way forward,” she said. “As I travel, I see Americans from so-called red states and so-called blue states who are ready to bend the arc of history toward justice.”
At an outdoor rally in Pennsylvania Mr Trump went on long tangents and hardly mentioned his usual points on the economy, immigration and criticisms of Mr Harris.
Instead, he relaunched criticisms of voting procedures across the nation and his own staff. He resurrected grievances about being prosecuted after trying to overturn his 2020 loss to President Joe Biden, suggesting at one point that he “shouldn’t have left” the White House.
And he intensified his attacks of a “grossly incompetent” national leadership and US media, at one point musing about violence against members of the press.
He noted the ballistic glass placed in front of him at events after a gunman nearly assassinated him at a July rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, and talked about places where he saw openings.
“I have this piece of glass here,” he said. “But all we have really over here is the fake news. And to get me, somebody would have to shoot through the fake news. And I don’t mind that so much.”
His campaign later sought to clarify his meaning.
“President Trump was brilliantly talking about the two assassination attempts on his own life, including one that came within a quarter of an inch from killing him, something that the media constantly talks and jokes about,” campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung said in a statement.
“The president’s statement about protective glass placement has nothing to do with the media being harmed, or anything else.”
Mr Trump also criticised John Bolton, his former national security adviser and now a strident critic. And he repeated familiar and debunked theories about voter fraud, alleging that Democrats could win only by cheating. Public polls indicate a tight and competitive race between him and Ms Harris.
“It’s a crooked country,” Mr Trump said. “And we’re going to make it straight. We’re going to make it straight.”
Mr Trump acknowledged that he was sidestepping his usual approach. He repeatedly mentioned how he disregarded the advice of his aides, telling their side of the story in a mocking voice.
Co-campaign manager Susie Wiles, long credited with bringing order to Mr Trump’s often-chaotic political operation, watched the former president silently from off stage.
Mr Trump at one point suggested that he would not deliver this version of his speech again: “I hope you’ve enjoyed this,” he said, “because I’m only doing this one time.”
