WASHINGTON – Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris will stir memories of the attack on the US Capitol by Donald Trump supporters with a speech on Tuesday at the same place where the former president addressed them on January 6, 2021, before their attack.

In Florida, former Republican President Trump’s White House campaign tried to move on from racist and other vulgar remarks made by speakers at his New York rally on Sunday.

“This is someone who is unstable, obsessed with revenge, consumed by grievances and in search of unchecked power,” Harris will say during her campaign closing argument in Washington, a week before the closely contested Nov. 5 presidential election.

Organizers told police they expected the rally to draw more than 50,000 people, the city’s police chief told NBC4 Washington.

A Reuters/Ipsos poll on Tuesday showed Harris’ lead falling to just 44 percent to 43 percent among registered voters. Harris has led Trump in every Reuters/Ipsos poll since she entered the race in July, but her lead has steadily shrunk since late September.

Trump and his allies have tried to play down the violence since Jan. 6, when thousands of supporters stormed the Capitol, sending lawmakers running for their lives and chanting “Hang Mike Pence,” the vice president, after Trump’s speech on the Ellipse. where as president, he told the crowd to “fight like hell” to prevent Pence and Congress from ratifying his loss.

Four people died in the ensuing riot at the Capitol, and a police officer defending the Capitol died the next day. Trump has said that if re-elected, he would pardon the more than 1,500 participants who have been charged with crimes.

Trump on Tuesday defended his widely criticized New York rally on Sunday that featured vulgar and racist remarks by allies, calling the event “an absolute love fest.”

Trump did not comment on the rhetoric used by speakers at the event, where a comedian called Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage” and disparaged black Americans, Jews, Palestinians and Latin Americans.

Although his campaign said the comments about Puerto Rico did not reflect the former president’s views, Trump called the event a love fest. “And it was my honor to be involved,” he said.

Court of Hispanic voters

Some 51 million Americans have already voted in the election, according to the University of Florida’s Election Hub, in a battle that will decide who will rule the world’s richest and most powerful country for four years.

Harris, who would be the first female president, and Trump, who is seeking a return to office after his 2017-21 term, differ on support for Ukraine and NATO, tariffs that could spark trade wars, abortion rights, taxes and basic democratic principles.

The candidates are neck and neck in the seven battleground states that will decide the election.

Trump said Harris would be too dangerous to become president, pointing to foreign wars and high levels of immigration during his tenure as vice president.

He said he waged a campaign of destruction. “But more than anything else it’s a hate campaign,” he said.

Both candidates are trying to cement voters’ views in the final days of a historically close election.

Trump aims to capitalize on voter unhappiness with rising prices and immigration, while Harris highlighted abortion rights and described Trump as a would-be dictator who would undermine US democracy.

Trump was due to visit a heavily Hispanic Pennsylvania town later in the day, two days after comedian Tony Hinchcliffe’s comments about Puerto Rico sparked outrage at the New York rally.

Puerto Ricans are the largest Hispanic group in Pennsylvania, the most important battleground state to win because it holds the largest number of the sept’s Electoral College votes, according to the Census Bureau. Reuters