Trump tells North Carolina rally he ‘defeated’ the worst president in history in ‘crooked Joe’: Live

Trump doubled down on a new nickname for Kamala Harris – “Lyin’ Kamala” – and described her as “a new victim to defeat.”

“[She is] the most incompetent and far left vice president in American history by the way, they did a poll… she was rated the worst vice president in history.

“Together, we will win North Carolina in an epic landslide.”

Trump told the crowds gathered in Charlotte that he was “supposed to be nice,” as he kept up his attacks on Kamala Harris, who he described with his newest nickname for the vice president – “Lyin’ Kamala.”

“You know, I was supposed to be nice. They say something happened to me when I got shot, I became nice,” he said.

“And when you’re dealing with these people – they’re very dangerous people. When you’re dealing with them, you can’t be too nice. You really can’t be so if you don’t mind, I’m not going to be nice.”

The former president adapted a selection of his favorite rally phrases to attack Harris, declaring: “Kamala, you’re fired. Get out of here. You’re fired,” – a reference to his reality TV show, The Apprentice.

Trump kicked off his rally by attacking Joe Biden and his decision to drop out of the race for the White House, saying that the president had been “defeated”.

“He quit because he was losing so badly in the polls, he was down at every single pole, and down by a lot, so he quit,” he told cheering crowds.

“But really what happened was the leaders of the Democrat party, in a very undemocratic move, the bosses, they said, ‘either you get out, or we’re going to throw you out using the 25th Amendment’ – that’s what happened.”

Donald Trump has arrived for his rally in Charlotte, North Carolina.

The president’s ear bandage appears to have shrunk again, now just a small skin colored band-aid covering the top half of his ear.

Trump is expected to turn his ire towards Kamala Harris, now his presumptive rival come November, after Joe Biden dropped out of the presidential race and endorsed his vice president.

Ahead of Donald Trump’s rally in Charlotte on Wednesday, the Democratic National Commitee (DNC) has put up billboards reminding North Carolinians of Trump’s “toxic” Project 2025 agenda.

The billboards will be live across the city of Charlotte near the Bojangles Coliseum.

In a statement released ahead of the rally, DNC Spokesperson Abhi Rahman said: “Let’s be clear: Donald Trump and JD Vance will enact their extreme Project 2025 agenda if elected in November and Democrats are doing everything in our power to stop them.

“This toxic agenda gives voters all of the proof they need that Trump and Vance aren’t looking out for North Carolinians, they’re looking out for themselves and the billionaires bankrolling their campaign.

“Trump’s Project 2025 agenda would turn the government into a tool to give Trump power like no president has ever had over Americans’ daily lives and raise costs for North Carolinians while also restricting our fundamental freedoms and enacting a national abortion ban. Democrats aren’t about to let that happen.

“Our message is simple: Look up Project 2025. We’re empowering voters with the truth about Donald Trump so voters can rally against Trump at the polls and reject Team Trump-Vance’s attacks on their rights, wallets, and democracy.”

Days before he fired an AR-15-style rifle at Donald Trump, a 20-year-old gunman had Google searched the distance between former president John F Kennedy Jr and his assassin Lee Harvey Oswald.

In testimony to a House Oversight Committee investigating the attack, FBI director Christopher Wray said law enforcement analysis of Thomas Matthew Crooks’s devices and digital footprint have not yielded “anything notable in terms of motive or ideology,” but “it does appear fairly clear that he was interested in public figures more broadly.”

“On July 6, he did a Google search for ‘How far away was Oswald from Kennedy?’ and so that’s a search that obviously is significant in terms of his state of mind,” Wray said on Wednesday.

Alex Woodward has the story.

Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance will hold three rallies next week in key swing states.

He will deliver remarks at a rally in Henderson, Nevada on Tuesday, July 30, 2024, at 1pm MT and then later at Reno, Nevada at 4.30pm.

The following day, Vance will speak in Glendale, Arizona at 6pm MT.

Donald Trump’s campaign has accused vice president Kamala Harris of committing a “heist” and a “brazen money grab” after she inherited President Joe Biden’s re-election campaign war chest.

Alex Woodward explains what’s happening.

The speech is Netanyahu’s fourth joint address to Congress. Netanyahu, the longest-serving prime minister in Israel’s history, received an uproarious applause. In the same way, he was flanked by many senior members of Congress and Senators. The speech comes as much of the international community has turned against Israel as it has conducted its war against Hamas after the terror group launched a surprise attack on Israel that killed 1,200 people.

Eric Garcia reports from Capitol Hill.