Former President Bill Clinton will visit Maine on Friday to campaign for Vice President Kamala Harris as Democrats look to shore up support the weekend before Election Day.
Details of the visit were not released by the Harris campaign, but Clinton, who served two terms as president in the 1990s, will be in southern Maine.
Maine is seen as a safe state for Harris overall, and she has outraised former President Donald Trump in donations from residents here. However, since the state splits two of its Electoral College votes by congressional district, Republican nominee Donald Trump could once again earn the one vote from the more rural 2nd District, as he did in 2016 and 2020.
Clinton, 78, won all four of Maine’s Electoral College votes both times he was on the ballot here. In 1992, 39% of voters supported him in a three-way race that featured Republican incumbent George H.W. Bush and independent Ross Perot. In 1996, during his reelection campaign, Clinton earned 51% of support from Maine voters, compared to 31% for Republican Bob Dole and 14% for Perot.
This election cycle hasn’t featured any visits to Maine from the candidates or their running mates, which is unusual. In 2016, Trump came to Maine five times, and his opponent, Hillary Clinton, also visited.
Harris’ husband, Doug Emhoff, campaigned here twice in July, and Tim Walz’s wife, Gwen Walz, visited in September. She was supposed to return this month, but that trip was canceled.
The biggest Republican name to campaign here was House Speaker Mike Johnson, although that was more to support 2nd Congressional District candidate Austin Theriault, who is challenging incumbent Rep. Jared Golden.
Both the Harris and Trump campaigns are expected to dispatch surrogates across the country over the next several days and through the weekend, especially in crucial swing states like Pennsylvania, Arizona, Michigan and Georgia.
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