Ahead of Trump’s Asheville visit, Democrats fight to maintain momentum
Democratic Rep. Eric Ager (left) and state party Chair Anderson Clayton (right) look on as Rep. Caleb Rudow speaks during an Aug. 14 press conference. Cory Vaillancourt photo
Seeing surging poll numbers and sensing strong momentum, Western North Carolina Democrats spoke out during a press conference in advance of former President Donald Trump’s appearance in Asheville last week, touting nominee Kamala Harris’ working families agenda and suggesting the state — as well as the 11th Congressional District — will be competitive this year.
“Trump is a con man, convicted felon and a fraudster who is doubling down on his extreme agenda to rig the economy for the wealthy at the expense of families in North Carolina,” said Anderson Clayton, chair of the North Carolina Democratic Party. “Vice President Harris is a brighter future for our state, one where families have the chance to not just get by, but to get ahead. And unlike Donald Trump, she’s going to put working families first.”
Clayton spoke to a small group of supporters at the Buncombe County Democratic Party headquarters just hours before Trump was slated to appear at the Harrah’s Cherokee Center and was joined by Buncombe County Democratic representatives Eric Ager and Caleb Rudow, along with retired educator Pat Deck.
Deck, speaking 89 years to the day after President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act into law, warned of the possibility of detrimental changes to the entitlement program she says Trump wants to make — particularly those outlined in the controversial Project 2025.
Trump has repeatedly disavowed Project 2025, a massive 900-page policy document produced by conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation, but he’s mentioned in the document hundreds of times, and Democrats aren’t buying his attempts to distance himself from it. At the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, Michigan State Sen. Mallory McMorrow spoke about the plan from the podium on Monday, and was expected to be the first among many to do so.
“Social Security is my earned benefit that I paid into throughout my years. No one should have a right to privatize my earned benefits,” Deck said. “There is so much at stake in this election, especially for North Carolina seniors, because Trump and his running mate JD Vance have made clear, crystal clear, they won’t protect Social Security and Medicare — programs that more than 2 million North Carolinians rely on — while their Project 2025 agenda will cut Social Security and Medicare.”
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Ager, a Buncombe County farmer and former Navy pilot, brought his perspective to the discussion, saying that Trumps’ tariffs put the livelihoods of farmers at risk.
“Leading economists, including Moody’s, are warning against Trump’s Project 2025 agenda, and saying that inflation will skyrocket if he is elected and goes through with his anti-working families plans,” he said, lauding Harris’ middle-class upbringing and Walz’ childhood on a farm not much different than his own. “He knows what it’s like for farmers struggling under tariffs, like what Trump implemented. He knows that farmers don’t just feed ourselves — we feed America and when farmers struggle, we all struggle.”
Ager also said that a Trump tax plan would raise taxes on working families by $2,600 per year, while giving people making more than $5 million a year a $325,000 tax cut.
Rudow, the 11th Congressional District nominee running against incumbent Congressman Chuck Edwards (R-Henderson), continued the criticism of Project 2025 — reiterating claims that it will raise taxes on working families while providing cuts for the wealthy just as Trump’s proposed tariffs would raise prices on everyday items and spark a recession.
Although Rudow faces an uphill battle in a gerrymandered district — nonpartisan redistricting website devesredistricting.org puts composite Democratic performance from 2016 through 2022 at 43.9% — he feels that his race will be competitive, in part because of the momentum Harris’ candidacy has brought to the General Election.
“I think this is going to be the year where a lot of races are going to be in play that people didn’t think before. And we’ve always said we’ve got to run a great campaign in N.C.’s 11th District, which I really believe we’re doing, but we also have to get some headwinds from the top of the ticket,” Rudow said. “The headwinds are looking really good right now. We’re gonna keep those up. I think [Trump] came here because he likes bullying people, he’s petty and because he sees that this race in North Carolina is in play.”
