Vice President JD Vance has spent the fall campaigning in convention halls, a sports gym and the apron of an airport hangar, and the president has been telling allies what he makes of the turnout.
President Donald Trump told allies that Vance “has not drawn large numbers to events that he is headlining,” according to people with knowledge of the private conversations, an account that surfaced Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2026, in the final stretch before the Tuesday, Nov. 3 midterm elections.
The two men split the map on Thursday, Oct. 29. Trump headlined a rally in Rock Hill, S.C., for Sen. Darline Graham, R-S.C., who was appointed to the seat after the death of her brother, Lindsey, and who faces Democrat Annie Andrews. Vance spent the same day in Weatherford, Texas, speaking for Republican Senate candidate Ken Paxton.
The White House sees no daylight between the two men. “Donald Trump is the hardest working person in the country, followed by JD Vance,” spokeswoman Danielle Alvarez said. Both men, she added, are raising money and working to get candidates elected.
Party operatives see Vance as the favorite for the 2028 Republican presidential nomination, and Trump has repeatedly declined to endorse him outright. At an Oct. 20 Oval Office event with Vance present, Trump said of an endorsement, “He’s a very talented person, and he’s a very good person, but we’ve literally, I don’t think we’ve ever talked about it.” He added, “We have to get through the midterms. We’ll see how it goes.” Vance had told Mark Halperin on the 2WAY platform a day earlier, “Look I think if I run the president will endorse me.”
The Hall That Didn’t Fill
Vance drew about 300 people to the Koury Convention Center in Greensboro, N.C., on Sept. 21, a local NPR affiliate reported. The hall holds 3,000. He was there for Michael Whatley, the Republican candidate for North Carolina’s open U.S. Senate seat.
Three days earlier, Vance appeared at an RNC midterm event at the Mid-America Center in Council Bluffs, Iowa, where turnout was modest and Iowa Republican congressional candidate Chris McGowan worked as the warm-up act. Vance campaigned for Michigan Republican Senate candidate Mike Rogers at the LevelUp Training Complex, an indoor sports training facility in Monroe, Mich., and appeared again for Rogers in Howell, Mich., on Oct. 27. There are no official attendance figures to compare with Trump’s.
About 200 people turned out for a Monday, Oct. 26, rally at Bozeman Yellowstone International Airport in Belgrade, Mont., for Vance and other Montana Republicans, according to local reports. Two hecklers standing behind Vance were removed after they had shouted about the release of files related to Jeffrey Epstein. He spoke for just under 30 minutes.
Empty Chairs Outside a Hangar
Rows of empty white folding chairs stood outside a hangar at Tyler Pounds Regional Airport in Tyler, Texas, in a widely shared X post from Oct. 13, taken minutes before Vance’s program began. The Trump War Room account on X answered for the president’s political operation, calling the post fake news and posting its own video of a crowd cheering the vice president’s arrival. How many people attended is not established by the available material.
Democrat James Talarico holds a lead of 2.8 points over Paxton in RealClearPolling’s average of their close race. Vance turned on the Democrat in his Weatherford speech. “Now James Talarico has also said that he really has to grapple with his masculinity in addition to his whiteness,” he said, adding, “And you know, James, the good news is, there ain’t a whole lot to grapple with.”
Call to Arrest the Press
Trump has made his own case in public. At a North Carolina rally on Tuesday, Oct. 27, he described a nightly schedule of events and an identical picture at each stop: big screens set up outside and thousands and thousands of people. “It’s massive crowds,” he said. The venue that night was full, but nobody was left waiting outside, and other stops have left even modest venues with empty sections.
Katie Rogers, a New York Times White House correspondent, reported that several areas of an upper deck sat empty at an Oct. 3 rally in Vandalia, Ohio. Writing on Truth Social, Trump demanded that journalists be arrested, saying the paper and other outlets should be arrested for dishonesty and a disservice to the country. He also wrote that the arena was maxed out and that the upper sections always empty out as people migrate down to the main floor.
Control of the House, and possibly the Senate, is what Republicans are bracing to lose. Democrats lead the generic congressional ballot 52.1% to 43.3% in RealClearPolling’s national average. Unfavorable polls and negative stories have pushed the president into a dark mood, leaving staffers on edge, and some GOP candidates are keeping their distance from him on the trail.
Canceled, Then Back On in Kansas
Trump held a rally Friday, Oct. 30, at the Ocean Center in Daytona Beach, Fla., for gubernatorial candidate Byron Donalds and Sen. Ashley Moody. Two White House officials and a Republican source said his midday rally Saturday, Oct. 31, at the regional airport in Salina, Kan., was called off. The Republican National Committee (RNC) said he would spend a “72-hour sprint” holding rallies by phone instead.
A day later, Trump reversed course and rescheduled back-to-back rallies for Sunday, Nov. 1, first in Dubuque, Iowa, then at the Salina airport. The Dubuque event was set to begin at 12:30 p.m. CT, with Trump speaking at 2 p.m. Doors at Salina were set to open at 3:30 p.m. CT for a 5:30 p.m. start, with Trump speaking at 7 p.m. The RNC planned replacement tele-rallies for nearly 20 states, and supporters who had responded for Saturday’s event had to re-reply for the rescheduled one.
The Salina stop was Trump’s second Kansas trip in two weeks, on behalf of Republican Sen. Roger Marshall, whose race against Democrat Adam Hamilton is projected a toss-up. Trump headlined a rally in Park City, near Wichita, on Oct. 19, and Vance campaigned for Marshall in Topeka on Oct. 26.
