By Jeff Mason and Trevor Hunnicutt
PHOENIX (Reuters) – U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris was campaigning in Arizona on Friday, hoping her less-than-month-old bid for the White House can put Republican candidate Donald Trump on a back foot in the West.
The Democratic presidential candidate has been on a week-long tour after naming her running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, with a focus on building excitement for her campaign in seven states that could tip the Nov. 5 election.
That tour brought her to Phoenix on Friday, where she was visiting with volunteers at a campaign office and speaking to voters.
While traveling, Harris won the endorsement of LULAC Adelante, the political action committee for the nation’s oldest Latino civil rights organization. It was the group’s first-ever presidential endorsement.
Trump was in the West too, holding a rally in Bozeman, Montana, a state that Republicans have carried in every presidential race since 1996 but which features one of the more competitive races for control of the Senate this year. Trump’s flight was reportedly diverted to a different Montana airport due to a mechanical issue.
“I just landed in a really beautiful place: Montana. So beautiful, flying over and you just look down and that’s the way it’s supposed to be,” Trump said in a video from his plane posted to Truth Social.
“I’m here to do some fundraisers and most importantly to support Tim Sheehy who’s running for the U.S. Senate and we think he’s going to do really well. We’re going to have a rally. And it’ll be a lot of fun.”
Sheehy will be facing Democratic Senator John Tester, who is seeking a fourth term.
Democrats hope to take two Western states that are closely divided between Democratic and Republican voters in November: Nevada and Arizona, both of which Democrat Joe Biden carried narrowly over Trump in 2020. Both are nearly a third Latino, a demographic group of key focus for both parties. Recent polls taken in both states point to an exceptionally close race.
Harris was due to head to Las Vegas, Nevada, on Saturday.
(Reporting by Jeff Mason and Andrea Shalal; Writing by Trevor Hunnicutt; Editing by Leslie Adler)