Ex-President Donald Trump was apparently so upset that his surrogates were bogarting the stage at his most recent campaign rally that he communicated a message to one of them through a teleprompter.
While stumping on Friday night in Glendale, Arizona, Republican U.S. Senate candidate Kari Lake was given a clear signal to finish her speech early so the former president could speak. Arizona Republic national politics editor Dan Nowicki tweeted a birds-eye view photo of the rally stage that showed Lake speaking to a crowd of supporters while a teleprompter message from someone named "Colton" instructed her to "wrap asap" with a timer showing that her speech had gone on for six minutes longer than her allotted time.
"[P]lease get off stage," the teleprompter read. "Trump waiting."
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Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-Arizona), who is the Democratic nominee challenging Lake in the U.S. Senate race, mocked his opponent by tweeting a photo of the teleprompter and writing: "MAGA Republicans finally catching up to the rest of Arizona."
Despite Lake's steadfast and unwavering support for Trump, the former president has been hesitant to reciprocate. The Washington Post reported earlier this year that, according to several anonymous sources close to Trump, he's doubtful that Lake has the ability to win elected office in Arizona and was worried that her candidacy may be a drag on his own chances in the Grand Canyon State. He was also reportedly annoyed about her frequent visits to his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.
Lake wasn't the only speaker at Trump's rally who he rushed off the stage. When Arizona Police Association president Justin Harris was speaking about crime rates, Trump — who was standing directly over his shoulder — was heard telling him "you gotta go." Harris then thumbed through several other pages of his speech, while asking the crowd to "let me finish up here please."
According to the Daily Mail, the crowd grew impatient with Harris after his speech dragged on for more than ten minutes. At one point, supporters reportedly chanted for the former president to take back the microphone.
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"Tell me again about how much Trump loves our police won’t you?" Progressive influencer Joanne Carducci tweeted.
Current polls of the Arizona U.S. Senate race show that Lake has an uphill battle with Gallego. Polls aggregated by FiveThirtyEight show Gallego up by as much as 11 percentage points over his Republican opponent in the key battleground state. Vice President Kamala Harris is also building on her lead over Trump, with a New York Times/Siena College poll finding her in the lead by a 50-45 margin.
In 2020, President Joe Biden became the first Democratic presidential candidate to win Arizona since 1996. He carried the state by roughly 11,000 votes across all 15 counties.
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