Former President Donald Trump is gearing up for a rally in Asheville, North Carolina this week, but not without a significant payment. His campaign had to stump up over $82,000 upfront for the event at the Thomas Wolfe Auditorium, according to Blue Ridge Public Radio (BPR).
Trump’s team, which first reached out to Asheville about the rally on August 8, managed to secure the venue after paying $82,247.60. City spokesperson Kim Miller mentioned that around $22,500 of this sum is for a two-day rental of the auditorium, while the rest covers various logistics, including staff, equipment rental, and facilities like port-a-potties.
This advance payment is due to Asheville’s rules for short-notice bookings, especially noteworthy given Trump’s history of unpaid rally debts that have accumulated to over $850,000 since he left office. Among outstanding invoices is more than $500,000 owed to El Paso, Texas.
Joe Raedle
For this rally, Trump’s campaign opted for the smaller Thomas Wolfe Auditorium, which accommodates around 2,431 guests, rather than the larger adjacent arena that holds 7,200.
Trump has always emphasized rally attendance, often embellishing numbers. Recently, he expressed criticism towards media coverage of attendance at Vice President Kamala Harris’ events, particularly after a series of well-attended rallies for both Harris and her running mate, Tim Walz.
Last week at Mar-a-Lago, he inaccurately stated that he had hosted a rally with 100,000 participants, and he also propagated a conspiracy theory suggesting that AI technology generated fake crowds at Harris’ recent Michigan rally, which attracted about 15,000 supporters.
Campaigning in North Carolina is essential for Trump, as the state has leaned Republican in presidential elections since the 1980s, aside from a narrow win by Barack Obama in 2008. Notably, Trump won North Carolina by less than 100,000 votes in 2020, and a recent poll indicates that Harris is now neck-and-neck with him in the state.