What's Rattling Trump: The Size of Harris's Crowds

The numbers game is everything to Donald J. Trump. Vice President Kamala
Harris�s first big rally appears to have gotten under his skin.

By Shawn McCreesh

Reporting from Atlanta
Published Aug. 4, 2024Updated Aug. 5, 2024, 9:03 a.m. ET

When former President Donald J. Trump walked onto the stage at his rally in
Atlanta on Saturday, fog machines shot white plumes of smoke into the air,
heralding his arrival.

If you looked closely, you could almost imagine steam pouring out of his
ears, too. All week long, something had been giving him the vapors.

�Crazy Kamala,� he fumed a minute into his speech. �She was here a week ago
� lots of empty seats � but the crowd she got was because she had
entertainers.�

Four days earlier, Vice President Kamala Harris had packed about the same
number of people (10,000) into the arena, the Georgia State University
Convocation Center. It was the first major rally of her newborn campaign,
and she had two rappers (Quavo and Megan Thee Stallion) on hand to hype up
her crowd.

Mr. Trump, who has been shunned by much of the entertainment industry, spun
this as somehow cheating in the all-important competition over crowd size.

�I don't need entertainers,� he said on Saturday. �I fill the stadium
because I�m making America great again.�

The numbers game has long been of paramount importance for Mr. Trump. As a
reality television star, he was obsessed with ratings (�What is it about me
that gets Larry King his highest ratings?� he wrote in one of his books).
This only intensified once he entered politics. He spent his first full day
in office as president trying to convince the news media that his
inauguration crowd was larger than the Women�s March. (It was not.)

The crowds he has drawn to his rallies this campaign season have been as
big as ever. Whether in blistering heat or deep freeze, his supporters line
up for hours beforehand to see him. Mr. Trump�s previous two rivals,
Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, could never compete with him on this front.
What will it mean if his new challenger can?

Ms. Harris�s rally in Philadelphia on Tuesday, when she is expected to
unveil her running mate, is likely to be a blowout. After that, she�s going
on tour, holding rallies in western Wisconsin; Detroit; Raleigh, N.C.;
Savannah, Ga.; Phoenix; and Las Vegas. It�s all starting to screw with Mr.
Trump�s psyche.

In Atlanta, his surrogates reassured everyone that he was still the hottest
ticket in town. �I can feel the energy, whew,� said Representative Mike
Collins, Republican of Georgia. �The freakin� lines are longer this time.
The crowds are larger this time.�

�There�s still people piling in right now,� Burt Jones, Georgia�s
lieutenant governor, said. �It�s unbelievable.�
2024 Election: Live Updates
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Here�s the latest on the presidential race.
Harris has faced party divisions over her choice of running mate.
Jimmy Carter is said to have plans to vote for Kamala Harris.

Still, Mr. Trump couldn�t help but focus on those who weren�t piling in. He
claimed that Georgia State University officials in charge of the arena
prevented him from letting in more people. �We have beautiful cameras set
up for the overflow crowds,� he said. A massive screen flashed to a live
video feed of his red-capped supporters milling around outside in the 90-
degree heat.

In Mr. Trump�s telling, this wasn�t a safety protocol but a conspiracy to
humiliate him, perpetrated by the university and other nefarious forces. It
all connects, in his estimation, to the biggest numbers game he has ever
lost. �If they�re going to stand in the way of admitting people to our
rally, just imagine what they�re going to do on Election Day,� he said.

This goes to the core of Mr. Trump�s crowd-size fixation. He seems to
believe that a full arena is a predictor of his ultimate victory � as if
the voters in that arena were representative of the country at large. In
his first presidential campaign, Mr. Trump�s sizable rallies were evidence
of a swell of support the political establishment didn�t understand. �Look
at the love and adulation � this is like a poll,� he said in one revealing
moment in Atlanta. �We have thousands of people. That�s better than going
out and paying a half a million dollars to have some pollster go out and
poll 212 people.�

Thirty minutes into his speech, he became distracted again by the seating:
�There�s some seats right up there � they could let them come in.�

He complained about the venue to Representative Marjorie Taylor-Greene,
Republican of Georgia, who was sitting in the front row: �It�s obviously,
Marjorie, a very liberal school, I guess, right? I�m not happy with the
school.� He claimed that �they don�t want to show that we�re successful.�

And then he was back, once again, on Ms. Harris and her crowd size. �She
has to go get entertainers,� he repeated. �They start leaving as soon as
she opens her mouth.�

This seemed like pure projection. If Mr. Trump had looked up from his
teleprompter at any point during the second half of his 90-minute speech,
he would have seen his own supporters slipping out of their bright blue
seats, headed for the exits. Slowly but surely, across every stand and in
every section, they streamed out. Stage left, a man in a star-spangled
cowboy hat sidled down his row at the halfway mark. Two men holding signs
bearing Mr. Trump�s mugshot tiptoed up their aisle a minute later. A young
woman led her family away just as Mr. Trump started to falsely tell them
that �Kamala Harris let in the savage monster who murdered Laken Riley.�

This happens at every rally, to a degree. And it is more a factor of the
time commitment involved than any sort of discontent with his message.
Supporters show up, get their photos for Facebook of the man in the arena
and, at some point during his discursive stemwinders, decide that they�ve
heard enough and that it�s time to go eat.

Still, an hour into his speech, the Atlanta crowd had emptied out more than
usual. (Like Madonna, he often keeps his crowds waiting for an hour or more
past the scheduled start time, which doesn�t help the situation.) Large
splotches of blue had blossomed across the upper stands, and people on the
floor had started to sneak away, too.

Mr. Trump�s most faithful followers were also feeling defensive about the
dueling rally discourse on Saturday.

�I think there was just a little bit of hype for her as she first comes
out, but I think that�s going to die out,� said Mark Adent, 57, the
executive vice president of a printing company in Atlanta.

But there was something about Ms. Harris�s star turn at the same arena that
had unsettled Mr. Trump. He seemed to be pining for the glory days of his
first campaign, back when his rollicking rallies were but a harbinger of a
stunning victory to come. He said that seeing two rappers open for Ms.
Harris reminded him of how Mrs. Clinton used musicians to help summon the
kinds of crowds he could command with ease.

�She got the idea from Hillary,� he told his supporters. �Hillary got Bruce
Springsteen, I�ll never forget, and the place was pretty full.�

�Not full like our places are full,� he quickly added. �I don�t have a
guitar. But our places are bigger � we get more people than anybody. I
don�t care how many guitars they have.�

HARRIS COUNTY, Texas - In a shocking announcement on Monday, Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg revealed felony charges against five individuals accused of orchestrating an illegal cheating scheme that granted unearned certifications to hundreds of Texas teachers.

According to Mike Levine, a chief in the DA Office’s Public Corruption Division, the ringleader of the operation is believed to have grossed over $1 million through this elaborate scheme.

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Photo of Vincent Grayson speaking to FOX 26 in 2023.

Who’s charged?

Vincent Grayson, 57: Head boys basketball coach at Booker T. Washington High School in Houston ISD. Grayson is charged as the organizer of the cheating operation. He’s alleged to have made $1,090,000 off of the scheme.

Tywana Gilford Mason, 51: Former director and VA certifying official at the Houston Training and Education Center. Mason allegedly used her position as a test proctor to keep the proxy scheme hidden. She’s alleged to have made $125,000 off the scheme. Records indicate Gilford Mason was prosecuted for Bribery in the early 2000’s.

Nicholas Newton, 35: Assistant principal at Booker T. Washington High School. Newton is accused of participating in the scheme by acting as a proxy test-taker. He’s alleged to have made $188,000 off the scheme by taking 430 tests.

Darian Nikole Wilhite, 22: A proctor at TACTIX who allegedly accepted bribes to enable Newton's actions as a testing proxy. It’s alleged he accepted $250 each time he allowed the testing to take place under his watch.

LaShonda Roberts, 39: Assistant principal at Yates High School. Roberts is accused of recruiting nearly 100 teachers to take part in the cheating scheme. She’s alleged to have charged each teacher she recruited, some cases ‘in excess of $1,000’.

All five defendants face two counts of engaging in organized criminal activity.

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Levine says this activity spans back to 2020, but it was in 2023, that the Texas Education Agency noticed some irregularities at a testing location ‘HTECH’.

"Often these people had previously failed the exam, they then drove to the Houston area, and suddenly they were passing the test with flying colors," said Levine.

He said as TEA was investigating, they got a tip on the scheme which led to more concrete evidence.

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He says TEA shut down HTECH at this time, but Grayson did not shut down the scheme, and simply moved it to a different testing location, TACTIX, where he allegedly recruited Wilhite.

Levine says the paying teacher would come to the testing center, check in, show ID, then leave within five minutes. Newton would sit in their place and take the test.

He says they caught Newton red-handed taking a test in February 2024. He says Newton would often take more than one test at once.

As for the 200 teachers, who received the false certifications, information on them is limited.

Ogg did say that at least two of them have been identified as sexual predators, being charged with sexual crimes.

"Once falsely certified had access through their employment to underage kids off campus and off. One has been charged with indecency with a child, the other, online solicitation," she said.

HISD held a last-minute press conference Monday to address media questions. They say all three HISD employees charged are on paid leave, and they knew nothing of these acts or investigation until "very shortly" before the arrests.

They confirm that HISD police helped organize some of the arrests. They say they are not aware at this time if any fraudulently certified teachers are employed within the district.

HISD sent this official statement:

"HISD was made aware of the investigation into an alleged cheating conspiracy shortly before arrests were made. Any educator who engages in conduct of this nature abdicates their responsibility to our students and to our staff and represents a complete betrayal of the public trust. HISD will cooperate fully with the Texas Education Agency and state and local law enforcement as the investigation progresses. All three of these employees have been arrested and will be receiving notifications relieving them of their duties effective immediately.

Additionally, if it is determined that any teachers currently working in HISD participated in this scheme or passed their certification exams fraudulently, we will take swift action to terminate their employment with the district."

TEA is the agency who the DA says will be looking through the list of 200 falsely certified teachers.

TEA responded to our list of questions with this statement:

"In accordance with State Board for Educator Certification (SBEC) rules, TEA will review any and all information shared by law enforcement and pursue appropriate action against any educator involved in this scheme. The SBEC will make a final determination on possible sanctions."

https://www.fox26houston.com/