Former President Donald Trump believes he can win New York state, the former president said on a tele-rally Saturday night with House Conference Chair Elise Stefanik (R-NY), Breitbart News exclusively learned.
The tele-rally, lead by Stefanik, dialed out to nearly one million Trump supporters to push early voting, a source familiar with Stefanik’s effort told Breitbart News.
“We want to get everybody out [to vote] because we think we could actually win New York,” Trump told supporters on the call. “We’re leading, as you know, in all the swing states, and I think we’re leading potentially very big. We set a record in early voting, and a lot of them were voters that don’t vote that much, which is pretty amazing.”
House representatives and candidates on the call were:
- Rep. Nick LaLota (NY-01)
- Mike LiPetri (NY-03)
- Rep. Anthony D’Esposito (NY-04)
- Rep. Mike Lawler (NY-17)
- Alison Esposito (NY-18)
- Rep. Marc Molinaro (NY-19)
- Rep. Brandon Williams (NY-22)
“We can take New York,” Trump reiterated before mentioning the GOP’s priorities in the Empire State.
“And if I take New York, you know, we’re talking about SALT (state and local tax deduction), and we’re talking about giving things that nobody else could even think about,” Trump said.
“We’re going to have to do things to create an incentive for New Yorkers to stay. I mean, they’re leaving New York,” he continued, “the richest of the people are leaving, and that means taxes of hundreds of millions and billions of dollars, and we can’t let it happen. So I just would like to have your support.”
In recent months, Trump gained strength in New York. Vice President Kamala Harris only holds 66 percent support in New York City, while 27 percent back Trump, a New York Times/Sienna College poll showed. In 2020, President Joe Biden won the city 76-23.
“We are doing very well upstate. We’re doing very well in Long Island and certain parts over there, like literally at 90 and 95 percent and Upstate is the same thing, and we should be doing the best of all in Manhattan,” Trump said, “[where] the people are living on the streets. I’ve never seen vacant stores on Madison Avenue. And the other day I went by and like almost it seemed that 50 percent of the stores are vacant. I’ve never seen a vacant store on Madison or Fifth Avenue, and you look now, it’s all vacant.”
Trump is scheduled to hold a historic rally at Madison Square Garden on Sunday. The event guest list includes former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Tucker Carlson, Tulsi Gabbard, Republican Vice-presidential candidate JD Vance, Stefanik, Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL), Republican National Committee Co-Chair Lara Trump, Eric Trump, and Donald Trump Jr.
“It’s so sad to see what’s happened to our city, but we’re going to turn it around, even if we have to work with a Democrat governor, or a Democrat mayor, we’re going to help them,” Trump pledged. “We’re going to turn it around and really, essentially make New York great again.”
Wendell Husebo is a political reporter with Breitbart News and a former RNC War Room Analyst. He is the author of Politics of Slave Morality. Follow Wendell on “X” @WendellHusebø or on Truth Social @WendellHusebo.