President Donald Trump and former President Barack Obama held rallies in Georgia just days apart, backing opposing candidates in two closely watched midterm races in the battleground state. Trump rallied at Guardian Centers in Perry on Saturday to support Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Jackson and U.S. Senate candidate Mike Collins.
Obama joined Democratic Senator Jon Ossoff and gubernatorial nominee Keisha Lance Bottoms at a rally in Morrow on Wednesday. Photos and videos from the two events offer a glimpse of the crowds who turned out to hear Trump and Obama make their cases ahead of Election Day, as the two traded jabs over each other's leadership. Obama joined Ossoff and Bottoms on Wednesday as Democrats sought to mobilize supporters ahead of the midterm elections.
Promoted as the United for Georgia Rally, the event was part of the Democrats' effort to boost turnout in two competitive statewide races. In his remarks, Obama took aim at Trump over rising costs and accused him of launching an “unnecessary” war in Iran. He also criticized Trump's White House renovations.
It can't have cracks in the column.” Trump held his rally on Saturday as he campaigned for Jackson and Collins, who are seeking to win the governorship and unseat Ossoff, respectively. During the event, Trump criticized Obama's stop in Michigan earlier that day, claiming the crowd had been small. The venue has seating for 8,000 people, according to its official website, though its capacity does not indicate how many attended Wednesday.
At Trump's rally in Perry on Saturday, photographs showed supporters filling the seating area. Seats were full more than an hour before Trump took the stage, and a couple hundred people stood behind them, according to The Mercer Cluster, Mercer's student newspaper. FOX 5 Atlanta also described the event as packed, but venue officials had not released an official attendance estimate.
Newsweek has contacted Guardian Centers and The Arena at Southlake for attendance estimates. Neither rally had a verified final attendance figure available in the sources reviewed. While photos and local reporting provide some insight into turnout at both events, they do not establish which rally drew the larger crowd.
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