GREELEY – Donald Trump says he has two theories for the National Football League’s decline in television ratings: the presidential campaign and Colin Kaepernick.
“I don’t know if you know – the NFL is way down in their ratings. And you know why? Two reasons,” the Republican presidential nominee said at a rally here Sunday. “Number one is this politics, they’re finding, is a much rougher game than football, and more exciting. And this, honestly, we’ve taken a lot of people away from the NFL. And the other reason is Kaepernick. Kaepernick.”
Trump took the stage here as the Denver Broncos were playing the San Diego Chargers. He told the crowd he was wondering what the game would mean for his audience size. Soon after, he was talking about the NFL’s problems.
It wasn’t the first time Trump has criticized Kaepernick, a San Francisco 49ers quarterback who has decided not to stand during the national anthem to protest police shootings of minorities and other matters he considers systemic problems nationwide.
“Maybe he should find a country that works better for him. Let him try. It won’t happen,” Trump told conservative show host Dori Monson on KIRO Radio in Seattle in August.
Earlier this month, the NFL’s ratings were down about 11 percent from last season.
As Election Day nears, Trump is redirecting his attention to traditionally Democratic states in the final days of the 2016 campaign in an urgent attempt to expand what for weeks has been an increasingly narrow path to victory.
Following FBI Director James Comey’s surprise announcement Friday that the agency would once again examine emails related to Hillary Clinton’s private use of an email server during her time as secretary of state, Trump and his advisers see a fresh opportunity to make gains in states that most public polls have shown as out of reach. They spent the weekend deliberating ways to seize on what they see as a dramatic turn in the campaign’s closing chapter and scramble the political map following a rough stretch beset by controversy.
Trump rallied Sunday in Colorado and New Mexico, and he was scheduled to make two stops Monday in Michigan – and visit Wisconsin the day after that.
Clinton, meanwhile, is focused on shoring up turnout and enthusiasm, particularly among minority voters, in such critical battlegrounds as North Carolina, Florida and Ohio. Early voting data from Ohio contains ominous signs of a lack of enthusiasm for Clinton, notably in places such as Cleveland’s Cuyahoga County, where high black turnout propelled President Barack Obama to victory in 2008 and 2012.
As a result, Clinton’s campaign has launched an intensive effort to send her most popular surrogates, including the president, first lady Michelle Obama and rapper Jay Z, across the country.
Clinton’s operation has also come out forcefully against what aides described as Comey’s “unprecedented” decision to release a “vague” and “misleading” letter. One senior aide said the campaign does not believe Comey’s actions have measurably changed the state of the race.
Nationally, the contest is tightening in tracking surveys to within the margin of error, but Trump remains behind by mid-to-high single digits – much as Mitt Romney was four years ago – in the states he is hoping to turn into unusual final-week fronts.
According to the latest Washington Post-ABC poll, a majority of all likely voters is unmoved by Comey’s decision, which has spurred a fierce backlash from Clinton backers.
Trump campaign chief executive Stephen K. Bannon has settled on three states in particular – Michigan, Wisconsin and New Mexico – where the candidate and campaign will devote more time and money, said four people familiar with the discussions who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal campaign talks. All three states were won by Obama in 2008 and 2012.
Bannon believes that if GOP voters rapidly “come home” nationally in light of recent events, that turnout plus late-breaking support among independents and blue-collar workers could bring new states into play beyond Pennsylvania, Nevada and Colorado – Democratic strongholds where Trump has been campaigning for months and remains behind, the people said.
