Trump Speaks for Nearly Two Hours in Greenville and Says Republicans Will Defy the Midterm Odds

President Donald Trump stood on stage for nearly two hours on Tuesday night in Greenville, North Carolina, and told supporters that Republicans will defy the odds in the Nov. 3 midterm elections. The rally, held on the grounds of the local airport, was built around one race: the fight for the Senate seat of retiring Republican Thom Tillis, where Democrat Roy Cooper holds a clear lead in the polls and some Republican groups have already cut their losses.

Trump backed Michael Whatley, a former senior party official, and brought Whatley and several down ballot Republican candidates on stage to speak. "I think you're gonna see some amazing results," Trump told the crowd. "They never poll us right. We have more spirit."

A schedule he calls work

Trump held the podium for about one hour and 52 minutes, one of the longest speeches of this election cycle. He said this midterm campaign is different from his past ones. "I'm doing something different. I'm working like a dog," he told rallygoers. "When I wasn't running, I didn't really campaign. I let other people campaign."

The numbers behind that claim are large. Trump has made 17 campaign stops since the Republican Party's two day midterm convention in Dallas last month, and he has traveled more than 29,000 miles since late September to lift Republican candidates. He said he has done about 10 rallies in eight days, plans about 18 rallies in the next 15 days, and expects to return to North Carolina once more before Election Day. Last month he set out a plan to visit 35 battleground districts before the vote.

The race behind the stop

North Carolina is not a state a confident party usually has to defend this hard. Trump won the state in each of his three presidential runs. This year, though, polls show former Democratic Governor Roy Cooper ahead of Whatley by nearly 10 percentage points in the RealClearPolitics average, in a race that could help decide which party controls the Senate.

Tillis, whose seat is open, split with Trump over the president's tax bill and defense policy. In an interview with Politico published on Tuesday, Tillis said his fellow Republicans were headed toward a "train wreck" in November. Tuesday was Trump's second stop in North Carolina in as many months, a sign of how much the White House thinks is at stake in the state.

The numbers hanging over the blitz

Trump is campaigning against a hard backdrop. His approval rating has fallen to 31 percent in the latest Reuters and Ipsos survey, the lowest mark at any point in his two terms in office. Polls show a clear majority of Americans unhappy with rising prices and with the war in Iran.

That is the gap the Greenville speech was meant to close: a president with record low approval, asking voters in a state he has won three times to turn out for a candidate the polls say is well behind, with 15 days left and early voting already under way across North Carolina.