Donald Trump to visit Mid-Michigan next week

Flint — Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump will deliver a speech on the economy in Potterville Thursday, his campaign has announced.

Trump will speak at 3:30 p.m. Thursday at Alro Steel, a distributor of metals and plastics, according to the press release, which didn’t describe the event as a rally and didn’t include a link for members of the general public to register to attend.

“President Trump knows that Michiganders can’t afford another four years of leadership that frivolously spends our hard-earned money,” the press release from the Trump campaign said. “President Trump will make America affordable again and make sure that more of our money stays in our pocketbooks.”

Trump’s campaign appears to be putting Michigan in the spotlight next week. It announced the upcoming event as the Michigan Republican Party convention was taking place Saturday in Flint.

In addition to the Potterville stop, the Republican nominee will speak at a conference of the National Guard Association of the United States on Monday in Detroit, and his running mate, Ohio U.S. Sen. JD Vance will visit the Big Rapids area on Tuesday.

The Detroit and Potterville events will be Trump’s seventh and eighth stops in Michigan of the year.

Trump last visited Michigan on Tuesday, when he spoke about crime during an event that wasn’t open to the public at a Livingston County Sheriff’s Office facility in Howell.

Trump is the only Republican presidential nominee since 1988 to carry Michigan. He won the state against Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016 by less than 1 percentage point, 47.5%-47.3%, or about 10,700 votes. But four years later, in 2020, Trump lost to Democrat Joe Biden by 3 percentage points, 48%-51%, in Michigan.

cmauger@detroitnews.com