Donald Trump will attend the Pittsburgh Steelers versus New York Jets game on Sunday, according to two sources, but it leaves campaign aides with a major headache.
Should he sit with his friend and ambassador, Woody Johnson, owner of the Jets?
Or does he risk alienating tens of thousands of voters in the critical swing state of Pennsylvania if he does not join the Rooney family, owners of the Steelers, in their box at Acrisure Stadium, in Pittsburgh?
With such a close election, everything matters.
Trump is due to hold a rally in nearby Latrobe on Saturday evening and is scheduled to man the fry station at a McDonald’s in Philadelphia the following day, a stunt designed to raise more questions about Kamala Harris’ vacation job in the 1980s.
DailyMail.com has learned that Donald Trump is planning to attend the Pittsburgh Steelers versus New York Jets football game on Sunday at the Acrisure Stadium
And it illustrates how the Trump campaign is all in on Pennsylvania.
It is the most important of the seven battleground states, with 19 electoral college votes, and a DailyMail.com/J.L. Partners poll this week showed the two candidates in a dead heat.
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Two sources told DailyMail.com that Trump is planning to be at the Sunday football game.
‘The only issue now is where does he sit? With the Rooneys or in Woody Johnson’s box and piss off the whole of Pittsburgh,’ said a source familiar with the question.
There is a problem, however.
Art Rooney II, the team president, was a donor to Joe Biden. And his father Dan was Barack Obama’s ambassador to Ireland.
The stakes could not be higher.
Pennsylvania narrowly went for Trump in 2016 but flipped to Joe Biden in 2020, by just over 70,000 votes.
Blue-collar Pittsburgh is a key battleground within the battleground. It votes Democratic, but is ringed by deep red counties that are crucial to Trump’s hopes of victory in the state and therefore central to his chance of winning the White House.
The Steelers have been owned by the Rooney family since they were founded in 1933. Arthur Joseph Rooney II currently serves as team president
Trump with Jets owner, and his former ambassador to London, Woody Johnson
Trump held a town hall near Philadelphia on Monday evening, and plans multiple visits in the final weeks of the campaign.
John Fredericks, radio host and Pennsylvania delegate at the Republican National Convention, said there was only one choice for Trump.
‘I know that Woody Johnson was his ambassador and that he is from New York,’ he said, ‘but if you are going to a Steelers game you’d better sit in the Pittsburgh box.’
A football game would fit with Trump’s macho, MAGA messaging as he takes on Harris, who is running to be the first female president.
Former Steelers wide receiver Antonio Brown fanned speculation with a social media post
And former Steelers wide receiver Antonio Brown fanned rumors that Trump would attend the game on social media.
He retweeted a post by Trump confidant Laura Loomer, floating the idea, and added his own message saying ‘Trump x AB’ followed by an icon of white and black hands clasping.
Trump is well known as a football fan. And even owned a franchise, the New Jersey Generals, in the short-lived U.S. Football League during the 1980s.