A Trump campaign built to battle Biden is forced to recalibrate to Kamala Harris

Less than a month ago, Donald Trump’s presidential campaign was riding high: He was ahead in the polls, led a unified party at the Republican National Convention and had a disciplined message to defeat President Biden.

In recent days, things have changed.

Vice President Harris’ entry to the race as the new Democratic nominee has erased his polling advantage, upended his messaging and forced a campaign built for battling Biden to recalibrate.

For most of 2024, Trump and his campaign were a well-oiled machine built almost exclusively around pummeling Biden as “weak, failed, and dishonest.” According to polling, that messaging was working.

Before dropping out of the presidential race and after his disastrous debate performance in June, Biden was losing to Trump in every major battleground state, often outside the margin of error.

Since Harris emerged as his replacement, polling suggests she does not have the same vulnerabilities or negative vibes as Biden, despite being his vice president. It has taken the Trump campaign some time to figure out what to highlight in attacking Harris.

The main message has remained consistent, blasting the Democratic Party’s policy stances around immigration and the U.S.-Mexico border, amplified by Harris’ involvement in tackling the issue since taking office.

After a failed assassination attempt against him at a Pennsylvania rally, Trump triumphantly took the stage in Milwaukee at the Republican National Convention as head of a party completely in his control and confident that voters would support his vision for America’s future.

Cycles of bad news

But in the weeks since Biden dropped out, the campaign has been dogged by bad news cycles — sometimes of his own creation — that have