Trump campaign defends decision to spend campaign time promoting new hotel

Donald Trump’s campaign has defended his eyebrow-raising decision to spend time promoting his business in the final days of the US presidential campaign as his poll numbers sink.

Trump campaign defends decision to spend campaign time promoting new hotel

Donald Trump’s campaign has defended his eyebrow-raising decision to spend time promoting his business in the final days of the US presidential campaign as his poll numbers sink.

With less than two weeks left before Election Day, the Republican candidate is taking a break from full campaigning today to formally open his new hotel in Washington.

Meanwhile, he is dispatching his running mate Mike Pence to Utah - which has not backed a Democrat for president in 52 years.

In other news for the Trump camp, Los Angeles police are investigating the vandalising of Donald Trump’s star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Detective Meghan Aguilar said investigators were called to the scene before dawn on Wednesday following reports that the presidential candidate’s star was destroyed by blows from a hammer.

A man who identified himself as Jamie Otis said he is responsible for the damage. Otis told Deadline Hollywood that he originally intended to remove Mr Trump’s star.

He said he wanted to auction it off to raise funds for the 11 women accusing the Republican candidate of groping them.

Mr Trump has denied the groping allegations.

Ms Aguilar said she is aware of the Deadline report but could not comment on whether Otis is a suspect.

Mr Trump’s star was dedicated in 2007 in recognition of his work on reality TV show The Apprentice.

Hotel stop mid-campaign

Mr Trump’s hotel stop follows a visit on Tuesday to another of his properties, the Doral golf course outside Miami.

The odd travel schedule less than two weeks before the November 8 election illustrates a Republican ticket pulled in two directions while Democrat Hillary Clinton surges.

Mr Trump’s campaign manager defended the stops, arguing that Mrs Clinton took time off to prepare for the debates and that stops at Mr Trump’s hotels highlight his business experience.

"Hillary Clinton took five days off to prepare for one debate and everyone looked at that as some kind of noble exercise," Kellyanne Conway said on NBC’s Today show. "He’s got the most active campaign schedule of the two candidates by far."

Mr Trump’s hotel visits dominated the campaign news on Wednesday at a time when Republicans see reports of rising Obamacare premiums and the hacked email of a Clinton campaign staffer as far more potent political arguments.

Mrs Clinton, meanwhile, has turned some of her focus to the post-election period, describing the difficulty of unifying the country after a divisive race.

Deep in transition planning, people familiar with her effort say Mrs Clinton plans to impose strict ethics rules on how lobbyists may participate in her effort.

"What Trump has done is to make it possible for people who had racist, sexist and all kinds of prejudices and bigotry to put them right out there," Mrs Clinton said on the Breakfast Club, a syndicated radio show based in New York City.

"I’m not going to be able to wave a magic wand and change everybody’s thoughts."

Later today, Mrs Clinton is holding two events in Florida, both aimed at encouraging voters in the state to cast early ballots.

It is the candidate’s 69th birthday, a milestone she celebrated a day early on Univision’s entertainment news show El Gordo Y La Flaca, where she was feted with a bottle of tequila and a large cake featuring her face and the White House.

Her campaign released two new ads on Wednesday billed as laying out her closing argument.

The spots, scheduled to run in seven battleground states, feature her plans to help families if elected and draw a contrast between her and Mr Trump.

"Our children are looking to us. What example will we set?" says actor Morgan Freeman, in one of the ads, as footage of children flashes on the screen.

Mr Trump’s hotel appearance comes amid signs that his controversial presidential campaign has hurt his corporate brand.

Rooms at the overhauled $212m hotel that bears his name at Washington’s Old Post Office Pavilion have been heavily discounted and smartphone data suggest fewer people are visiting his properties compared with rival venues nearby.

A new Facebook live show produced by his campaign has heightened speculation that Mr Trump may try to offset any losses with advertising revenue by starting a media network - a plan he denies.

At his Miami golf course, employees, many of them Hispanic women, offered testimonials about how happy they are working for him - touting Mr Trump’s job-creating prowess.

He also promoted the workers as examples of people affected by rising Obamacare premiums, though the golf course’s general manager later clarified that most workers receive their insurance through Mr Trump as their employer.

The federal government announced this week that premiums for insurance under President Barack Obama’s signature healthcare law would rise sharply next year - news some Republicans heralded as an unexpected political gift.

"He could make this race for the last two weeks a referendum on Obamacare. But of course he won’t do that," said former Ted Cruz strategist Chris Wilson.

"It’s just a matter of him swatting at flies instead of having a coherent and consistent message."

After stopping at the hotel not far from the White House, Mr Trump will visit North Carolina for what his campaign is billing as an urban policy speech.

Besides Utah, Mr Pence is also stopping in the swing states of Nevada and Colorado before he heads on Thursday to solidly Republican Nebraska, a state that awards some of its electoral votes by congressional district.

His rally in Omaha may be aimed at shoring up support in the one district that Mrs Clinton could potentially win.

Spokesman Marc Lotter said Mr Pence’s Utah visit is more about favourable logistics than fears the deep Republican state could be slipping away.

Mr Pence had already planned a western swing that included a fundraiser in Utah, he said, adding that a rally was easy.

But Mr Trump cannot count on heavily Mormon Utah, last won by a Democrat when President Lyndon B Johnson carried the state in 1964.

Many of the state’s top Republicans urged Mr Trump to abandon the race following the release of a 2005 recording in which he bragged about sexually accosting women.

That has been a boon to independent presidential candidate Evan McMullin, a former CIA agent and graduate of Brigham Young University.

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