I stormed into Gastonia and made Cooper's pathetic polling lead tremble before my magnificence.

I touched down in Gastonia on Wednesday for my first rally since the Republican midterm convention in Dallas, and let me tell you — the crowds were HUGE, TREMENDOUS, the biggest crowd anyone has ever seen in Gastonia, maybe the biggest in North Carolina history, and the fake media was there with their little cameras trying to make it look small, which is very SAD, because it was NOT small. The Guardian — a VERY failing outlet, very failing — they wrote that my party faces an “unforgiving midterm landscape” and that I have “deep unpopularity.” FAKE. FAKE polls, FAKE news. I am the MOST popular president in the history of this country, maybe in the history of the world, and the people of North Carolina know it. They LOVE me. They came out by the THOUSANDS. I’m not bragging — actually I am bragging, because I earned it — but the crowds were SPECTACULAR.

Now the only number the fake media wants to talk about is the one where Roy Cooper — a VERY BAD politician, a very weak man, very weak — supposedly leads Michael Whatley. FAKE polls. You know it, I know it, everybody knows it. But that’s okay, because I touched down to SAVE this race, and that is EXACTLY what I did.

I told the crowd to “pretend I’m on the ticket” and to “crush the communists” in November, and believe me, when I’m on the ticket — and I basically AM on the ticket — Republicans do TREMENDOUS, they do INCREDIBLE, the best results anyone has ever seen. The best. And Michael Whatley — now there is a man, a BALL-BREAKER, one of the GREATEST men I ever worked with in government, I had my choice of the whole country and I CHOSE Michael Whatley, because I pick winners, I always pick winners — Michael Whatley is going to WIN this seat. He is the candidate of LAW AND ORDER, and when it comes to criminals, he wants them executed, arrested, or DEPORTED, and frankly so do I.

The Democrats — the Democrats are VERY worried. They NEED this seat because they can’t win the Senate without it, they have to flip FOUR Republican-held seats and this is the ONE they think they can get, which tells you everything you need to know about how DESPERATE they are. Roy Cooper, a failed governor, a man who PRETENDS to be something he’s NOT — I said it on stage and I’ll say it again: “He tries to pretend he’s a moderate. He’s NOT.” He is a RADICAL, a total radical, and the people of North Carolina are going to SEE that and they are going to REJECT him. He thinks he can hide behind that nice smile and that nice suit — very nice suits, by the way, I give him credit for the suits — but underneath it, TOTAL radical. NEVER supported the police, NEVER supported the border, a DISASTER when he was governor, an ABSOLUTE disaster.

And let me tell you what I did on that stage that the fake news does NOT want you to know about. I showed the people of Gastonia the TRUTH. I showed them the mugshots — dozens and dozens of mugshots, very bad people, very dangerous — and I told them about what happened to Iryna Zarutska, a beautiful young woman, 23 years old, a Ukrainian refugee, and she was STABBED to death on a light rail train in Charlotte, STABBED, horrible, horrible — and the man who did it, Decarlos Brown Jr., very dangerous man, very bad man — Roy Cooper, under his watch, this man was WALKING THE STREETS. Now, the fake fact-checkers — very dishonest people — they say I “falsely claimed” he was released by Cooper. FAKE. This happened on Cooper’s watch. The crime, the chaos, the BAD MANAGEMENT — that is Cooper’s record. Period. The people in that crowd understood it perfectly.

You know who else did the same thing? George H.W. Bush. GREAT president, by the way. He ran against a guy named Dukakis, Michael Dukakis, who had a HUGE lead — VERY big lead — and Bush showed the people what happens when you have a weak governor who lets criminals out of jail. Willie Horton. VERY bad guy. And I said on stage — and this is VERY important — “Same exact thing as this. Same EXACT thing.” The Willie Horton play is a WINNER. It has ALWAYS been a winner. And Cooper? Cooper is the new Dukakis. EXACTLY the new Dukakis. Same lead, same weakness, same result — a LOSS. A big, BEAUTIFUL loss.

Now Whatley did a TREMENDOUS job. He stood on that stage and he called me “the greatest president of our lifetime” — very nice, very true — and I called him a “ball-breaker” and “one of the greatest men I ever worked with in government,” which is TRUE, because I don’t say things that aren’t true, unlike the FAKE MEDIA. I had my choice of the whole country, and I chose Michael Whatley, because I have the BEST judgment, the BEST instincts, people are ALWAYS saying that — very smart people — “Sir, your judgment is UNBELIEVABLE.” And they’re right. They are ABSOLUTELY right.

The Democrats held some kind of press conference before the rally — very LOW energy, very sad — and this State Senator, Woodson Bradley, she said “Why would Whatley back a war that is driving up prices for North Carolina families at a time when it’s already too hard for us to get by?” Very nasty woman. Very nasty. Let me tell you about prices — the ONLY reason prices are high is because of the Fed, which is VERY hostile to me, VERY hostile, and they raised interest rates AGAIN today, a quarter-point, first time since 2023 — UNNECESSARY, totally unnecessary — and I said it, I said they’re “a bunch of politicians” and the rates are “too high” and they are doing the WRONG thing. If the Fed would just LISTEN to me — and I understand money better than ANYONE, believe me, my uncle was a great professor at MIT, great genes, the BEST genes — if they would just cut rates like I’ve been saying, prices would PLUMMET, the economy would BOOM, North Carolina would be TREMENDOUS, and Roy Cooper would LOSE, lose BADLY, which he is going to do ANYWAY because I came to Gastonia and I made sure of it.

So Cooper leads? FAKE. Whatley can’t win without me? VERY WRONG. The Fed is independent? WRONG again — they’re supposed to be working for the COUNTRY, not against the president, and I will REMEMBER this. I ALWAYS remember. The people of Gastonia came out, the crowd was SPECTACULAR, Michael Whatley is going to the SENATE, and Roy Cooper is going HOME. That is the DEAL. That is the DEAL I made with the great people of North Carolina, and Diklis Chump ALWAYS keeps the deal. ALWAYS.