One of Donald Trump's top political strategists has claimed the Kamala Harris presidential campaign is "giving up on North Carolina" after it was reported they had canceled over $1,700,000 of reserved television advertising in the battleground state.
On Tuesday Chris LaCivita, a senior adviser to the Trump campaign, shared media buying and analytics data which said the Harris had removed $1,721,302 of planned spending in the state, split between the "Charlotte, Greensboro, Greenville, Greenville-New Bern, Norfolk, Raleigh, and Wilmington markets."
The claim was repeated by Breitbart, a conservative leaning outlet, which said the "more than $1.7 million in canceled ad buys by Harris's campaign in North Carolina" indicate the "Tar Heel State is no longer in play."
North Carolina is one of a number of key swing states which are widely expected to decide the 2024 presidential election outcome, along with Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia, Nevada and Arizona. Losing North Carolina's 16 Electoral College votes would be a blow to Harris, though Joe Biden won in 2020 despite Trump winning the state.
In a post on X on Tuesday LaCivita said: "Kamala Harris giving up on North Carolina..pulling money out. Maybe to drop in Virginia to try and stop the slide?" He shared figures indicating $1,721,302 worth of advertising had been cut by the Harris campaign for markets covering North Carolina, though he didn't provide his source.
Separately advertisement tracking company AdImpact on Tuesday claimed the Harris campaign had cut "over $2 million" from the North Carolina advertising market.
Posting on X the company said: "Yesterday, the Kamala Harris campaign placed new #NCPol ad reservations totaling $2.7m for the final week of the election. This morning, the campaign is cutting from those NC reservations. So far today, we've seen over $2m removed from NC markets."
Newsweek contacted the Kamala Harris and Donald Trump presidential election campaigns for comment via email on Wednesday.
The Harris campaign has given no public indication that it has given up on North Carolina and the vice president is holding a rally in Raleigh on Wednesday.
According to the University of Florida's election lab, as of 30 October, 3,367,548 people had voted in North Carolina, either via in-person early voting or mail ballots that had been returned. Of these 34.1 percent were registered Republicans, 32.8 percent were registered Democrats and 33.1 percent were independents or had a minor party affiliation.
In 2020, $154.8 million was spent in North Carolina on the 2020 presidential election campaign according to Democracy in Action, an independent group which monitors presidential election campaigns. This placed the state third overall, behind only Florida and Pennsylvania.
An AtlasIntel poll of 1,665 likely voters in North Carolina, conducted between October 25 and 29, gave Harris a 0.5 point lead in the state with 48.9 percent of the vote to Trump's 48.4 percent. It had a three percentage point margin of error.
On Wednesday bookmakers Bet365 and Paddy Power both had Trump as favorite to win the 2024 presidential election overall, with odds of 10/21 (67.7 percent) and 4/9 (69.2 percent) respectively.
However an analysis of all 50 states by Bonus Code Bets, based on artificial intelligence, concluded Harris was ahead with an estimated 276 Electoral College votes against 262 for her Republican rival.
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