Trump plans phone-in rally for Glenn Youngkin on eve of Virginia

Former President Donald Trump plans to hold a tele-rally for his supporters Monday night, urging them to back Virginia Republican gubernatorial candidate Glenn Youngkin in the following day’s election, Bloomberg reported Friday.

Youngkin, who is attempting to pull off an unlikely victory over Democrat Terry McAuliffe on Nov. 2, has managed to keep the 45th president at arm’s length during the campaign. It was not immediately clear whether Youngkin would take part in the Trump tele-rally.

Youngkin accepted Trump’s endorsement after winning the Republican gubernatorial nomination in May, but has disavowed the former president’s claim that the 2020 presidential election was stolen by the Democrats and emphatically condemned the deadly Jan. 6 riot by Trump supporters at the US Capitol.

“With regard to January 6, there is no room for violence in America,” Youngkin told Axios in September. “None. Absolutely not. And therefore, I think there’s just no room for it. We must condemn it every day of the week.”

Trump teased the possibility that he would travel to Virginia earlier this week, when he issued a statement telling supporters he would “see you soon!” On Thursday, Trump attempted to walk back a statement he made earlier this month telling Republicans not to vote in either the 2022 or 2024 federal elections if the result of the 2020 election was not overturned.

“The statement that I made a few weeks ago … was in no way meant to imply that I would tell them not to vote, but rather that they may not have the incentive to vote if the election process is not fully remedied, and quickly,” Trump claimed. “It was the Crime of the Century. We are working on solving that problem every day—it will be done! People do not want to spend their time and money to have a SCAM like that happen again. Regardless of anything or anyone, we must get out the Republican and SANE VOTE!”

McAuliffe and the Democrats have sought to tie Youngkin to Trump, with President Biden mentioning his predecessor’s name two dozen times at a rally with McAuliffe in Arlington this past Tuesday.

“He won’t allow Donald Trump to campaign for him in this state,” Biden claimed of Youngkin. “He’s willing to pledge his loyalty to Trump in private, why not in public? What’s he trying to hide? Is there a problem with Trump being here? Is he embarrassed?”

Youngkin has slowly made up ground on McAuliffe in the polls over the past two months. Most surveys now show the race as a statistical tie, though a Fox News poll released Thursday showed the Republican leading by 8 percentage points among likely voters.

Neither the Youngkin campaign nor a spokesman for Trump responded to requests for comment by The Post.