Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump will hold a rally in Scranton, Pennsylvania this evening towards the end of his last full day of campaigning.
Trump will speak from the Lackawanna College Student Union beginning at 5:30 p.m. Eastern Time. The rally can be viewed live in the embedded YouTube player via Right Side Broadcasting.
At this time, this is the final rally that Trump has scheduled in Pennsylvania. He pays a visit to the state as he begins to catch up in polls there, although Hillary Clinton still maintains a strong lead. In Real Clear Politics’ polling average, Clinton is ahead of Trump by 2.8 percentage points. At the beginning of October, though, Clinton was leading Trump by a margin of 7.5 percentage points.
Hillary Clinton is now going on the defense in Pennsylvania, a state once thought to be a lock for the Democrats. Later today, Clinton will be holding an event in Philadelphia, where she will be joined by President Barack Obama, First Lady Michelle Obama, as well as her husband, Bill Clinton, and her daughter, Chelsea Clinton. Plus, Hillary Clinton already held a rally in Oakland earlier today.
If Trump were somehow able to surprise everyone and win Pennsylvania, this would dramatically increase his odds of becoming president. The state is worth 20 Electoral College votes, and so winning it would give Trump some wiggle room where he could lose other battleground states and still win the election. For example, if he wins Florida, Ohio, Iowa and Arizona but loses North Carolina, Nevada, and New Hampshire, he would be at 259 Electoral College votes. Winning Pennsylvania brings him up to 279 votes, though, and so it would make up for the loss of three swing states.
After his Scranton rally, Trump will head up to New Hampshire for a rally in Manchester and then to Michigan for a rally in Grand Rapids. That Grand Rapids rally is currently the last campaign event Trump has scheduled.