STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Last month in Philadelphia, I went for a run, ended up going up the "Rocky" steps - the ones Sylvester Stallone's character runs up in triumph during the movie, "Rocky."
MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
Generations after the movie came out, it is still an iconic spot, as Steve just told you, and that is where Vice President Harris chose to end her presidential campaign late last night.
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VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS: And here at these famous steps, a tribute to those who start as the underdog and climb to victory...
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MARTIN: Harris was speaking just before midnight. Former President Trump was in another swing state, Michigan, where he spoke in the early hours of the morning in Grand Rapids - the same place he finished his last two campaigns.
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DONALD TRUMP: It's unbelievable. Think of it. This is it. This is the last one that we're going to have to do.
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INSKEEP: We've reached two NPR correspondents who've been following the campaigns all this time. We'll begin with political correspondent Danielle Kurtzleben. Danielle, good morning.
DANIELLE KURTZLEBEN, BYLINE: Hey. Good morning.
INSKEEP: OK, so how did Trump close it out?
KURTZLEBEN: Well, as we just heard in that clip that you just played, Trump's been doing this thing lately where he's been getting kind of sentimental during his speech about all of this being over - all of this being the campaign, but especially his campaign rallies. He's done this a few times in recent weeks. He had a bit more to add in Grand Rapids late last night.
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TRUMP: But here's the good news. All we were doing is putting ourselves in a position to win, which we can do tomorrow very easily if we show up.
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KURTZLEBEN: Now at these recent events, I will say, he's been getting smaller crowds than he's gotten in the past. He didn't quite fill the Fiserv Forum in downtown Milwaukee Friday night. Yesterday, at an arena in Reading, Pennsylvania, it was about half full. That's where I was. He also didn't fill his arena in Raleigh yesterday, either.
Now, you can read that a couple of ways. One is that enthusiasm is waning. Maybe that's true. But also, it's also possible that he's just been to these states a lot, and his supporters just don't feel the need to see him for the fifth, six, seventh time.
INSKEEP: Yeah. And ultimately, elections are decided by who votes, not who shows up at the rallies. But how did the substance of these rallies sound?
KURTZLEBEN: Well, he's still saying a lot of the same stuff. He's promising mass deportations. He's saying tariffs are a grand economic fix, though there are some real doubts about that. He also, though, the last couple of days, has been spreading election disinformation preemptively. He's been spreading false stories about the Pennsylvania system while he's been in that state, which lays the groundwork for him and his supporters to deny the results if they so choose.
Now, at least one of his stops you can see is very intentionally chosen because Reading is two-thirds Latino, and a lot of those Latinos are Puerto Ricans, specifically. So that is a way you can see him maybe extending an olive branch to those voters who might have been offended by some recent comments. But to zoom out, if this is his last campaign, this is the end of an era. It's the end of the Trump rally. He has been this singular personality in politics. He has reshaped the Republican Party. And if he loses, they're really going to have to figure out its identity after Trump.
INSKEEP: OK. I want to hang onto something that you mentioned there because you said that Trump went to a heavily Latino city - Reading, Pennsylvania. Our colleague Deepa Shivaram joins us next. Deepa, good morning.
DEEPA SHIVARAM, BYLINE: Hey. Good morning.
INSKEEP: And I bring you in now because, if I'm not mistaken, Kamala Harris also stopped in Reading yesterday. Is this right?
SHIVARAM: Yeah, she did. So after a comedian at last weekend's Trump event called Puerto Rico a, quote, "floating island of garbage," that just has been mobilizing Puerto Rican voters. And Democrats have really been seizing on that, and that's been a real focus for the Harris campaign. She had celebrities like rapper Fat Joe with her yesterday. Here's what he said in Allentown.
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FAT JOE: Now, I started this with telling you, where's the orgullo? Where's the pride? Where's your pride? If you're still out there talking about you might be voting for somebody or you're not decided, where's your pride as a Latino?
SHIVARAM: And as Danielle pointed out, I mean, there are more than 500,000 Latino voters in the state of Pennsylvania, most of them with ties to Puerto Rico. So people at this Allentown rally had huge Puerto Rican flags. And then after that, you know, Harris drove for an hour to make it to this stop at a cafe called Old San Juan Cafe in Reading, like you mentioned. And, you know, on the last day of her campaign, you're running up against the clock. The fact that she drove an hour to get there - that says a lot. So this is a state that has 19 electoral votes. A majority of voters there don't vote until Election Day itself. So this is a huge battleground state and one where the vote is going to be really, really close, right? And because of that, every voter group is critical to turn out.
INSKEEP: And that 19 is a critical number. It is hard to find another swing state. You can't find another single swing state to replace it if you lose it. That's what makes it so essential. So what was that final day like for Harris?
SHIVARAM: Yeah. I would describe it as, you know, the event sort of building in size and scale over the course of the day. Harris started at a canvass kickoff in Scranton that had about 200 supporters. There was a big homemade banner there to help get out the vote. Then she went to that Allentown event, then that stop in Reading, and ended the day with these really big rallies in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. That one at the Rocky Steps, like you mentioned, had 30,000 people.
INSKEEP: Wow.
SHIVARAM: And Harris kept her message to voters pretty brief. She wants them to vote. She wants them to tell people that they know to go out and vote. But I will say, one thing that was different here was that she didn't really talk about Trump at all at any of her events. She mentioned him briefly, sort of referring to him as the other guy, but that was really it. Really, for her, it was emphasizing this final message about who she is, her story, you know, growing up going to civil rights protests. And she's been wrapping up her rally saying that her campaign is not just about being against something and that she wants to be a president for all Americans.
INSKEEP: Well, we're talking here about getting the last few people out to vote. But Danielle, what's known about people who have already voted?
KURTZLEBEN: Well, we know that more than 82 million people have cast ballots thus far. Now, there hasn't been as much mail voting as in 2020, during the pandemic.
INSKEEP: Sure.
KURTZLEBEN: But the in-person early voting has been really big. I mean, we've seen those record numbers in states like Georgia and North Carolina. Now, one thing that's interesting, though, is that Republican messaging for their voters to turn out earlier has gotten through because, in the past, they had cast doubt on some of these methods. And those Republican voters are turning out, but it's hard to say if that means anything. It could just be that people who would have voted on Election Day are now voting earlier.
INSKEEP: I really appreciate that note. 2020 was so different. It's hard to draw comparisons now. It's hard to take any clue and really know who's winning or who's going to win. But, Deepa, when will we know something for real?
SHIVARAM: Oh, that is the question, Steve. If you find out, let me know.
INSKEEP: (Laughter).
SHIVARAM: As we know, mail ballots are taking longer to count. They have to be verified. So, you know, less mail voting means that we may see faster results in some places compared to 2020. But the key thing here to remember is that this race is about the margins. We've been saying that for so long. So a state can count ballots relatively quickly. But if the margins in this race are so tight, outlets like the Associated Press, which, you know, NPR here and many other outlets rely on to call these races - places like the AP won't be able to make these quick calls, so election officials have been urging a lot of patience.
INSKEEP: And we'll use all the patience we can and get you the best information we can. NPR's Deepa Shivaram and Danielle Kurtzleben, thanks to you both.
KURTZLEBEN: Thank you.
SHIVARAM: Thanks for having us.
INSKEEP: Hope you get some rest. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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