President Donald Trump is joining a Texas welcome party for Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who's visiting the United States amid trade tensions between the allies.
Tens of thousands of Indian Americans were expected at a Houston rally — "Howdy Modi!" — on Sunday.
Trump planned to stop later in Ohio for an event with Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, fresh from a state dinner on Friday at the White House, at an Australian-owned manufacturing plant. Trump was to end his day in New York as he readies for events this coming week at the U.N. General Assembly, where Modi also will give a speech.
Pakistan children dress up like injured Kashmiri children and hold a portrait of U.S. President Donald Trump during a demonstration organized by International Human Right Movement to express solidarity with Indian Kashmiris, in Lahore, Pakistan, Sunday, Sept. 22, 2019. Tensions between Pakistan and India, two nuclear-armed countries, has increased since Aug. 5, when India downgraded the autonomy of its side of Kashmir and imposed tighter controls on the area. (AP PhotoK.M. Chaudary)
India and the United States have been talking for months to try to resolve trade issues. In June, the Trump administration accused India of imposing a wide range of trade barriers, and the U.S. ended preferential trade deals with India. In return, India levied higher import duties on U.S. goods.
When Trump and Modi meet at the United Nations later this week, they also are expected to discuss the situation in Kashmir. The government in New Delhi stripped the disputed Himalayan region of its semi-autonomy and launched a security crackdown last month.
President Donald Trump shakes hands with Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison in the Oval Office of the White House, Friday, Sept. 20, 2019, Washington. (AP PhotoEvan Vucci)
President Donald Trump talks with reporters before leaving on Marine One on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, Sunday, Sept. 22, 2019. Trump is traveling to Texas and Ohio before heading to New York to attend the upcoming United Nations General Assembly. (AP PhotoSusan Walsh)
FREELAND, Mich. (AP) — Donald Trump returned briefly to the campaign trail Wednesday and called the judge presiding over his hush money trial “crooked” a day after he was held in contempt of court and threatened with jail time for violating a gag order.
Trump's remarks at events in the battleground states of Wisconsin and Michigan were being closely watched after he received a $9,000 fine for making public statements about people connected to the criminal case. In imposing the fine for posts on Trump's Truth Social account and campaign website, Judge Juan M. Merchan said that if Trump continued to violate his orders, he would "impose an incarceratory punishment.”
“There is no crime. I have a crooked judge. He's a totally conflicted judge,” Trump said speaking to supporters at an event in Waukesha, Wisconsin, claiming again that this and other cases against him are led by the White House to undermine his campaign.
The former president is trying to achieve a balancing act unprecedented in American history by running for a second term as the presumptive Republican nominee while also fighting felony charges in New York. Trump frequently goes after Merchan, prosecutors and potential witnesses at his rallies and on social media, attack lines that play well with his supporters but that have potentially put him in further legal jeopardy.
Later at a rally in Freeland, Michigan, he said he was being forced to spend days in a “kangaroo court room," and claimed without evidence the district attorney was taking orders from the Biden administration.
“I've got to do two of these things a day. You know why? Because I’m in New York all the time with the Biden trial,” he said. “It's a fake trial. They do it to try and take your powers away, try and take your candidate away.”
Even before the hush money trial got underway on April 15, Trump has held just a handful of public campaign events since becoming his party’s presumptive nominee in March.
The gag order bars him from making public statements about witnesses, jurors and some others connected to his hush money case. Trump is still free to criticize the judge and the district attorney.
Trump insists he is merely exercising his free speech rights, but the offending posts from his Truth Social account and campaign website were taken down. Merchan is weighing other alleged gag-order violations and will hear arguments on Thursday.
Attendees agreed he is being unfairly prosecuted, contending the trial and gag order were designed to distract him .
“It’s a trial looking for a crime,” said Ray Hanson, of Hartford. Hanson said he expected Trump’s lawyers would “keep him in line” so he doesn’t violate the gag order, as much as he likely wants to talk about the trial.
Manhattan prosecutors have argued Trump and his associates took part in an illegal scheme to influence the 2016 presidential campaign by purchasing and then burying negative stories. He has pleaded not guilty.
Trump’s visits to Wisconsin and Michigan mark his second trip to the swing states in just a month. For the previous rallies, the former president largely focused on immigration, referring to people who are in the U.S. illegally and who are suspected of crimes as “animals.”
Meanwhile, Democrats are hoping to remind voters ahead of these visits about Trump's position on abortion, which Trump has been openly concerned about being a political liability for him and Republicans.
Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan met on Wednesday with half a dozen women, including a family doctor, and warned that a second Trump term would threaten abortion rights even in her state, which enshrined those rights in its state constitution after the Supreme Court overturned national rights to the procedure.
Whitmer appeared with the women at a bookstore in Flint surrounded by signs that read “Stop Trump’s Attacks on Health Care” and “Stop Trump’s Abortion Ban.” She told reporters not to believe Trump’s contention in a Time Magazine interview that Republicans would never have enough votes in the U.S. Senate to pass a national abortion ban.
“We cannot trust anything that Donald Trump says when it comes to abortion. So no one should take any comfort in the fact that, yes, he wants an abortion ban, but he won’t get it because he doesn’t think we’ll have 60 votes in the Senate. Baloney,” she said.
Wisconsin and Michigan are among a handful of battleground states expected to decide the 2024 election.
For Trump to win both states, he must do well in suburban areas like the areas outside of Milwaukee and Saginaw, Michigan, where he visited Wednesday. He underperformed in suburban areas during this year's primary even as he dominated the Republican field overall.
Trump has repeatedly falsely said that the 2020 election was stolen from him. Trump’s losses in battleground states in 2020 have withstood recounts, audits and reviews by the Justice Department and outside observers.
In an interview Wednesday with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Trump did not commit to accepting the results of the 2024 election.
“If everything’s honest, I’ll gladly accept the results. I don’t change on that,” Trump said. “If it’s not, you have to fight for the right of the country.”
Gomez Licon reported from Miami, and Bauer reported from Waukesha, Wis.
Follow the AP's coverage of the 2024 election at https://apnews.com/hub/election-2024.
Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally in Freeland, Mich., Wednesday, May 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)
Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump reacts after speaking at a campaign rally in Freeland, Mich., Wednesday, May 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)
Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally in Freeland, Mich., Wednesday, May 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)
Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally in Freeland, Mich., Wednesday, May 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)
Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally in Freeland, Mich., Wednesday, May 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)
Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally on Wednesday, May 1, 2024, at the Waukesha County Expo Center in Waukesha, Wis. (AP Photo/Morry Gash)
Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump arrives to speak at a campaign rally on Wednesday, May 1, 2024, at the Waukesha County Expo Center in Waukesha, Wis. (AP Photo/Morry Gash)
Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally on Wednesday, May 1, 2024, at the Waukesha County Expo Center in Waukesha, Wis. (AP Photo/Morry Gash)
Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump arrives to speak at a campaign rally on Wednesday, May 1, 2024, at the Waukesha County Expo Center in Waukesha, Wis. (AP Photo/Morry Gash)
Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally in Freeland, Mich., Wednesday, May 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)
Former President Donald Trump speaks to the media outside the courtroom of his trial at Manhattan criminal court, Tuesday, April 30, 2024, in New York. (Curtis Means/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump speaks to reporters at Manhattan Criminal Court in New York, Tuesday, April 30, 2024. (Victor J. Blue/The Washington Post via AP, Pool)
