Biden to campaign in St. Paul, Trump event to be invite-only at Rochester airport
ST. PAUL, Minn. (FOX 9) - Both presidential candidates will campaign in Minnesota on Friday, just four days before Election Day.
President Donald Trump's early evening rally will be held at the Rochester International Airport after the event moved locations at least twice. The event was originally scheduled for the airport before the campaign suddenly moved it to McNeilus Steel in Dodge Center. But late Thursday, the event was moved back to the airport, according to the mayor of Rochester. It will be held at 5 p.m., according to the city.
The reasons for the switch were not immediately clear, but appear to be linked to Minnesota's 250-person limit on crowd size during the coronavirus pandemic.
Rochester city attorney Jason Loos told FOX 9 that the event will now be smaller, describing it as an "invite-only friends and family event."
"This is not going to be a rally," Loos said in an email.
According to an update from the Trump campaign, the first 250 people will be admitted.
Asked whether state officials were forcing Trump's team to make the changes, a spokesman for Gov. Tim Walz said the governor's office has not been in touch with the Trump campaign on Thursday.
Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden has scheduled a drive-in campaign event in St. Paul at 3:45 p.m. The Biden campaign hasn't answered questions about the event's location.
Both campaigns have spent considerable time in Minnesota over the last few months—a state which Trump lost to Hillary Clinton by a narrow 1.5% margin in 2016. Recent polls show Biden has a small lead over the president.
When asked Friday morning if his Minnesota campaign stop shows he's concerned about the state, Biden gave the following answer to a pool reporter.
“No I’m not concerned," Biden said. "We’re gonna be in Iowa, we’re gonna be in Wisconsin, so I thought I’d stop in Minnesota. I don’t take anything for granted."
Biden's visit is his second since absentee voting started Sept. 18. Trump's rally will be his third in Minnesota since voting started.
Nearly 1.2 million absentee ballots have already been returned statewide as of last Friday, according to the Minnesota Secretary of State Office. That amount is already about 40 percent of the entire voter turnout in 2016, and will grow when the new weekly numbers are released Friday.