President Donald Trump addresses supporters Monday night during a re-election rally in Rio Rancho, New Mexico. Tuesday, he travels to California. Photo by Justin Hamel/UPI |
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Sept. 17 (UPI) -- President Donald Trump will visit Northern and Southern California Tuesday for more campaign stops in the heavily Democratic state, a day after he stumped in New Mexico, another traditionally Democratic state.
Trump is scheduled to leave Albuquerque late Tuesday morning and fly to the Bay Area, where he will participate in an afternoon roundtable discussion with supporters in Palo Alto. After a fundraiser, the president will travel to Los Angeles and participate in similar events and finish the day in Beverly Hills.
His exact destinations for parts of the trip were not publicized, due to potential protests.
In the Bay Area, Trump is scheduled to join Housing and Urban Affairs Secretary Ben Carson on the trip to discuss California's homeless problem.
Carson is expected to talk about the concept of homelessness "opportunity zones," which would offer tax breaks to persons who invest in low-income communities.
Since taking office, Trump has regularly criticized the state of California on a number of issues. Recently, he blamed housing regulations, rent control and lack of police action for exacerbating homelessness.
"The president's very concerned with the homelessness crisis in California," Council of Economic Advisers Chairman Tom Philipson said. "The Trump administration is working to reverse the failed policies of the past."
In a letter to Trump Monday, Gov. Gavin Newsom called on the president to make federal investments to address housing.
"In California, state, local and state governments have ramped up action to lift families out of poverty by investing in behavioral health, affordable housing and other homeless programs," Newsome wrote. "In contrast, your administration proposed significant cuts to public housing and programs like the Community Development Block Grant."
Newsom asked the administration to provide 50,000 vouchers for two state programs that help low-income individuals and create a "best practices" program for landlords.
The last time Trump visited the Bay Area was during his 2016 campaign, which resulted in a fight between Trump supporters and opponents.
"Everybody would like to know where the event is, but due to Bay Area failure on the president's prior trip [in 2016] as 'candidate Trump' ... I'm sure the secret service is particularly concerned about that," GOP California committeewoman Harmeet Dhillon said.
California has voted Democratic in every U.S. presidential election since 1988, after having voted Republican in six straight elections from 1968 to 1988.
