Pool Reports of October 29, 2020

Out of town pool report #1 — pool at Doral

?Good morning from Miami. Five days to go. POTUS and former VP Biden will both be in the state of Florida for a short time today.

Pool has been Covid tested and made the short drive from our RON to Doral, arriving at 9:25 a.m. Security sweeps getting underway now.

POTUS is scheduled to depart Doral at noon and fly to Tampa for the first rally of the day.

Out of town pool report #2 — rolling for MIA

?Motorcade is on the move and leaving Trump National Doral at 12:17 p.m. Destination: Miami International Airport.

Pool was swept and then had about a two hour hold in the Ivanka Trump Ballroom. We did not see POTUS getting into the SUV.

Out of town pool report #3 — wheels up to Tampa

Motorcade arrived on the tarmac at Miami International Airport at 12:25 p.m. after a short drive from Doral and pulled to a stop beside AF1 at 12:28.

POTUS quickly exited his SUV and boarded using the lower stairs before pool could get in place beneath the wing.

Others boarding now from the back steps. We will be wheels up for Tampa momentarily.

Out of town pool report #4 — Tampa arrival

?AF1 was wheels up from MIA at 12:39 p.m. and wheels down at Tampa International Airport at 1:25.

Uneventful flight; no visitors to the press cabin.

We'll be motorcading shortly to Raymond James Stadium, home of the Bucs, where the rally with POTUS and FLOTUS is taking place in the north parking lot.

Out of town pool report #5 — rolling to Tampa rally site

?POTUS stepped off AF1 at 1:43 p.m., came down the main stairs carrying a red hat.

FLOTUS (in dark sunglasses, a white print dress and black Louboutins), who flew separately and had been waiting in a car on the tarmac, came around to greet him and the couple embraced briefly, then both chatted with the two greeters (see below), waved to the pool and got into the waiting SUV.

Motorcade rolling now at 1:47 to the stadium, which is visible off on the horizon just to the east of the tarmac.

>From the White House—The President is met by:

State Representative Chris Sprowls
State Representative from Florida's 65th District and Speaker-Designate of the Florida House of Representatives

Shannon Sprowls
Spouse of State Representative Chris Sprowls

Out of town pool report #6 — rally arrival

?Motorcade reached the rally site at 1:54 p.m. and POTUS and FLOTUS were being announced just as pool was getting out of vans. "God Bless the USA" playing as he takes the stage.

Big crowd on a grassy field north of the stadium (the end zone with the pirate ship) with three blocks of bleachers behind the stage.

Remarks available via livestream/television as usual.

Out of town pool report #7 — Tampa rally ends

?**Programming note: You've likely seen by now that the rally this evening in Fayetteville, NC has been postponed due to weather.**

POTUS wrapped at 3:30 p.m. after speaking for nearly 90 minutes. YMCA on blast. FLOTUS returned to the stage for the goodbye.

Motorcade rolling out at 3:34, headed back to the airport and possibly to JBA (will send confirmation on the schedule when we get it).

Rally snippets:

FLOTUS spoke first, expressing happiness to be home in Florida and then urging undecided voters to give her husband four more years and defending his record on the pandemic.

"In a time when hate, negativity, and fear are the messages the media streams into our homes and the large tech companies are protecting political censorship, we need to remember what is really important: my husband's administration is focused on the future," FLOTUS said.

She also promised that people would have "all the medical supplies you need."

Then she introduced her husband: "President Donald J. Trump."

POTUS, who wore his red MAGA hat from the start, began on prompter but peppered this speech with a lot of ad-libbing — a bit more than normal — about the media, jobs numbers and his 2016 election victory.

He referred to Miles Taylor as "a real lowlife" and said that CNN and Google should fire him because "bad things are going to happen to him" and calling his anonymous leaks a "horrible, treasonous thing."

"There should be major criminal liability for some scum like this," POTUS continued. "He should be prosecuted. Are you listening to me back in Washington? He should be prosecuted. Along with the New York Times."

When he picked up the teleprompter again, he offered another aside: "This is boring."

After reading some lines about the economy, he was back to "the laptop from hell," telling supporters that aides have urged him not to focus on it as much.

"They're calling me up, 'Sir, you shouldn't be speaking about Hunter. You shouldn't be bad things about Biden because nobody cares.' I disagree," he said.

He also grumbled about the lack of media pickup following the Tucker Carlson interview Tuesday night: "The next day—nothing."

He mentioned several other journalists by name: John Roberts ("not perfect"), Chris Wallace (complaints about the first debate), Mike Wallace ("a friend"), Kristen Welker ("she was fair, because she always gave me 10 seconds") And Fox & Friends hosts "Ainsley, Steve and Brian" ("really great!").

On Biden: "Not a nice guy, not a smart guy."

And: "Could you imagine losing to this guy?"

He then pushed back on apparent media suggestions that such comments from him are a sign he thinks he's going to lose: "No I don't. I think you're going to lose."

Later he mocked Biden's crowds, calling crowd size "the ultimate poll."

He said vaccines are coming "very soon" and if Biden were president "we wouldn't have a vaccine for four years." Also warned that with Biden there would be no school, no Thanksgiving, no weddings, etc.

Today's video elements were a montage of clips featuring press secretary Kayleigh McEnany's recent comments on Fox News and then the video of Democratic governors' testimonials about the administration's pandemic response.

POTUS called McEnany to the stage along with her husband, Tampa Bay Rays pitcher Chad Gilmartin, who held their baby in his arms, before rolling the clips.

When the video wrapped, he thanked her, asked Gilmartin about the Dodgers — "are they a great team?" — and thanked them. "Great couple," he said. She did not address the crowd.

Several attendees were helped out midway through the remarks by medical personnel because of the heat. It's 86 degrees and muggy. There did was a fire hydrant or hose behind the crowd that was shooting water into the air for a while to provide some relief from a mist.

When Trump noticed it, he called attention to the waterworks and said to the crowd: "Are they friend or foe?... Let's find out if they're friend or foe. And if they're foe, let's take care of those sonofabitches."

Out of town pool report #8 — Tampa departure // still NC bound for Ft. Bragg

?Motorcade arrived back at Tampa International Airport at 3:41 p.m. and POTUS climbed the main stairs and aboard at 3:42 before the pool was in place beneath the wing.

We will be wheels up shortly.

Judd Deere tells us we are headed to NC for the Fort Bragg military engagement even though the rally has been canceled.

New handout for the pool:

Out of town pool report #9 — NC arrival

??AF1 wheels up from Tampa at 3:55 p.m. — with Mark Meadows in the press cabin explaining the decision to cancel the Fayetteville rally, which he said will be Monday morning — and wheels down at Pope Army Airfield in NC at 5:05.

Cloudy skies but sun is breaking through; no rain at the moment. Little windy on the tarmac.

POTUS (no longer wearing the red cap) and FLOTUS deplaned using the lower stairs at 5:19 waved, clapped and got into the Beast. He shouted to the pool in response to a question about the cancelled rally but was hard to hear over the wind.

"The wind was terrible...were redoing it on Monday," he said, per co-pooler Alex Leary who was in position to make out some of it.

Motorcade rolling now.

>From the White House—

The President and First Lady are met by:

LTG Michael Kurilla
Senior Army Commander, XVIII Airborne Corps, United States Army, Fort Bragg

CSM William Lohmeyer
Senior Enlisted Advisor, United States Army, Fort Bragg

Col Patrick Wampler
Deputy Commander, 43rd Air Mobility Operations Group, United States Air Force

CMSgt David Najera
Superintendent, 43rd Air Mobility Operations Group, United States Air Force

Out of town pool report #10 — pool separated from POTUS motorcade

?The press vans have been held back on the tarmac and separated from POTUS's motorcade, which appears to have headed on to Ft. Bragg.

We were driven to the edge of the tarmac at Pope Field and are now holding with no explanation yet as to what's going on.

Out of town pool report #11 — leaving NC

Pool, which never left the now dark tarmac, spotted POTUS' motorcade pulling back through the gates at 7:05 p.m. and eventually rejoined the motorcade for the short ride back to Air Force One.

POTUS and FLOTUS boarded using the lower stairs at 7:09 and without engaging the pool.

Boarding now.

Still no additional info from staff on the nature of this event with the troops, but will pass along anything else we get.

An updated daily schedule went out a few minutes ago with the anticipated return time to JBA, although we are already about 30 minutes behind.

We should be wheels up shortly.

Out of town pool note #12 — note on Lil Wayne tweet

?Upon inquiry by co-pooler Alex Leary, campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh says regarding the Lil Wayne tweet:

"Kayleigh is going to tell you guys on the plane. It's a real picture from Miami this morning."

Rolling now from Pope Field.

Out of town pool report #13 — JBA arrival and McEnany gaggle

?AF1 wheels up at 7:19 p.m. Wheels down at JBA at 8 sharp. Deplaning now.

As we were beginning our descent, Kayleigh McEnany came back to the press cabin and spoke on the record for just more than nine minutes. The first six minutes are transcribed below, will send the final three ASAP.

On the "troop engagement" event at Fort Bragg:

"So the president met with Army special operations forces. He gave the presidential unit citation to our heroes who conducted the al-Baghdadi raid, what was it? a year and three days ago today in Syria. It was a really special moment. It meant a lot to the president. He was with our heroes for about an hour, just having casual conversation, taking their questions, just talking to them and then he ended the visit by paying his respects to the special forces memorial. It was all in all about an hour and a half."

On Lil Wayne:

"His account was not hacked. I know there are reports out there that it was hacked. That was not the case. The president met with Lil Wayne this morning in Miami. They had a really good, productive meeting. Lil Wayne's team had been talking to the White House and Little Wayne directly you the White House a little bit and it just materialized with the tweet today and it was a good meeting that they had."

Q: is the president watching the stock market?

"I haven't spoken to him directly about that but I know he was quite enthused by the GDP numbers this morning, 33.1%, largest ever growth in a single quarter and its picking up about two thirds of what we lost in the pandemic so he's very encouraged by that and we continue to exceed expectations.

"So did you see the other breaking news when I was gone? Hunter Biden? ...there is a DOJ source that confirmed there has been an FBI investigation going back to 2019 into Hunter Biden and his associates for money laundering and the reporting says it's still open today. I don't know whether that's true, I guess that's for you guys to ask the questions, or your DOJ beat reporters."

Q: did POTUS discuss this with AG Barr?

"No. The president was not aware of that when the reporting came out. In fact, I saw the reporting on my phone and I showed it to him."

Q re which troops were at Fort Bragg w POTUS

"I can't confirm exactly who was there. I can just say t was the team that conducted the al-Baghdadi raid. Very special, significant moment and it was very special to see the president interacting with our men and women in uniform."

Q: Dr. Fauci is back in the news for advocating for a national mask mandate. Is the president aware of that? Does he have any response?

A: I haven't seen Dr. Fauci's comments. The president's always followed CDC guidelines, which is wear a mask when you can, socially distance. That's where the president's always stood. Nothing has changed.

Q: Was the president informed, was he concerned about what happened with his supporters at the Nebraska rally the other night after he left, getting stuck in the cold for several hours?

A: The present loves his supporters and in that particular case we had ... again this is more a question for the campaign so I'm just going to repeat what they've said ... which is we had about double the buses as the campaign normally has there. There were tents where there were hand warmers available, hot chocolate. There was some road closures that made it logically difficult. But the president loves his supporters, wants to make sure they are taken care of. We look at each and every rally to make sure that happens. But just make no mistake, he loves the men and women of Omaha. He wants to make sure they were taken care of in the aftermath and certainly as we saw the reporting.

Q: Was that a factor in the decision to postpone today's rally?

A: That was the campaigns decision but as I understand it there was bad weather and very strong winds. It just wan't possible to do.

Q: The president has previously said he might be willing to put money into his campaign. Do you know if that's been discussed?

A; I'd have to refer you to the campaign on that.

Q: Does the president have plans to speak with Emanuel Macron?

A: Not that I'm aware of but who knows. We're just trying to get from place to place as we approach this five state swing (she later clarified that.

Q: There was an NBC report about retaliation by Iran for the Solemani killing. Is there any concern about something imminent happening

A: I haven't seen that or I haven't looked into that. The president is very proud of his decision ... our good, hard working military men and women, who are the ones who took out Solemani and Al-Baghdadi. Tremendous accomplishments and I think our heroes deserve all the credit there and this president for being a leader and making those decisions.

Eli Stokols

Out of town pool report #14 — rolling from JBA

?POTUS and FLOTUS came down the main stairs at 8:11 p.m. in a light rain and got into a waiting SUV to motorcade back to the White House.

Rolling now, and that wraps our three-day swing.

Handing off to in-town-pool.

Out of town pool report #15 — Kayleigh gaggle transcript part two

?Here is the final bit of the McEnany AF1 gaggle, and many thanks to co-pooler Alex Leary for helping transcribe.

Q: How did Little Wayne come together?

A: There have just been conversation that have been going on for quite some time. The president you're seeing a number of people come in and support him because his accomplishments speak for themselves I mean, permanent HBCU funding, criminal justice reform, lowest black unemployment, home ownership going up, wages going up. And of course the pandemic we had to artificially shut down the economy but it's coming back and I think the GDP numbers today are evidence of that. I think you're seeing a lot of supporters come off the sidelines and want to joint president in a second term.

Q: Is the president concerned about the rising cases we're seeing across the country ... economically for example?

A: The president believes that we're going to continue to go on the trajectory we're currently on, which is back to the hottest economy in modern history. We're constantly monitoring the pandemic. But it's worth noting, as the president has consistently, that we've seen an 85% reduction in the fatality rate. We have working therapeutics now. We're at a different place now than we were in March certainly. We have a great testing system, a high volume of tests; and I think what you're seeing is if you're under 70, your chances of surviving are upwards of 99% and above 70 it's still very close to that range because it's a testament to Remdesivir, dexamethazone and the president deregulating and making those possible. And we're still hoping for a vaccine by the end of the year and it would be the fastest vaccine in history and President Trump deserves all the credit for that.

"Thank you, everybody."

In-town pool report #1 // rolling

?The president is motorcading from JBA to the White House because of a bad weather call. It's cloudy here at the field with intermittent rain. We're now rolling at 8:11 pm.

In-town pool report #2 // WH return

?President Trump arrived back at the White House at 8:35 pm. It was an uneventful trip and we did not see POTUS upon arriving.

In-town pool report #3 // lid

?We have a lid at 8:39 pm. Night, all.