Washington state chair confirms Trump visit to ‘Greater Seattle area’

Despite reports that Donald Trump’s visit to Seattle was cancelled, Trump state chair Don Benton confirmed that the Republican presidential candidate will be making a fundraising campaign rally in the Greater Seattle-area as scheduled.

The rally will be at 7 p.m. Tuesday at Xfinity Arena in Everett, following a  fundraiser that same day. Trump’s campaign added the rally to his official website Friday.

State Sen. Benton told KIRO Radio’s Dori Monson, “I have known him to be a man of his word the whole time I’ve known him so this doesn’t surprise me. He told me he was coming and, by golly, he’s coming.”

There were plans for both a private fundraiser and public rally in Seattle but there were reports that the events had been cancelled.

The Washington Post’s Power Post blog reported that Trump’s new campaign team had persuaded him to cancel the Seattle public rally because there is no need to spend so much time in a state where Trump is 19 points behind according to a recent Elway Poll.

When Trump visited Lynden in May, there were thousands of supporters there to see him then and he promised to come back.

But now there are just 75 days left until Election Day, and Wednesday’s Washington Post story said his new campaign managers want to focus more of his time on states where the race is close and he can win.

“He has to start banking his time and focusing his attention on just those areas that are going to be competitive. That’s areas like Ohio, Pennsylvania, North Carolina,” Washington Post Deputy Political Editor Rebecca Sinderbrand said via Skype. “Those are areas that are extremely tight. Washington State is not on that list.”

Benton said Trump’s visit with the flood victims in Baton Rouge changed his schedule and that a stop in Portland has been canceled.

“We’ve got a lot of folks coming up from Oregon to the rally to see Mr. Trump since we had to adjust the schedule,” he said.

Benton told Dori that Trump loves Washington and that he believes Trump can win the heavily Democratic state.

“There are a number of people, and it’s hard to put a number on this, but there are quite a few people that are going to vote for Mr. Trump that just don’t want to say so,” Benton said. “They’re afraid of maybe losing their job if they say so, they’re afraid of a fight with their sister if they say so. There are a number of reasons why people just don’t want to tell you who they are voting for. But if you talk to them privately, they will tell you they are fed up with the Democrat Party policies that have killed this country over the last 50 years. And they know it. If you’ve lived in a city like Tacoma or Seattle that’s been dominated by Democrat politics for 40, 50 years, ask yourself: Are you doing better or are you doing worse?”

KIRO 7 contributed to this story. Stay tuned for more updates.

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