CNN
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Donald Trump, who said Sunday in Pennsylvania that he regrets leaving the White House in 2021, is ending the 2024 campaign the way he started it – with a mix of violent, derogatory rhetoric and repeated warnings that he will not accept defeat in case of defeat.

At a rally in the battleground, must-win state, the former president told supporters he “shouldn’t have left office” after the 2020 election loss, called Democrats “demonic” and complained about a new one poll that no longer showed him leading in Iowa, which he carried twice.

Trump spent much of his speech railing against alleged election interference this year and regretting leaving office after losing to Joe Biden four years ago. Trump claimed that the United States had the “most secure border in the history of our country” on the day he left office.

“Honestly, I shouldn’t have gone,” he continued, recalling the aftermath of the last election.

Trump acknowledged that he had gone off script and claimed again – in a district he won by more than 15 points in 2020 – without evidence that this vote was against him.

“Isn’t that better than my speech?” Trump said. “Because honestly, someone needs to talk about it.”

His comments represented a continuation of the increasingly vindictive message that dominated the final weeks of his campaign: retaliation against his political rivals. Angry, threatening tirades against the press corps. Increasingly outlandish claims about the 2020 election and his desire for total power if he becomes president again.

At one point, the former president, the target of at least two assassination attempts, said he “wouldn’t mind” if a gunman targeting him also fired through the “fake news.”

“I have this piece of glass here. But all we really have here is the fake news, right? And to get me, someone would have to shoot through the fake news,” Trump said at a rally in Lititz, Pennsylvania. “And that doesn’t bother me that much. I don’t mind.”

A Trump campaign spokesman said after the rally that the former president was actually thinking about how the press was protecting him.

“President Trump stated that the media was in danger by protecting him and therefore was in grave danger itself and should have had a glass shield as well. There can be no other interpretation of what has been said. “He actually cared about her well-being, much more than his own!” said Steven Cheung in a statement.

The former president’s latest threats and outrageous statements cap a campaign with one of the darkest and most ominous final messages in modern American history. In the last few weeks alone, Trump has reaffirmed his promise to use the military to combat the civilian “enemy within” and, under the guise of claiming he is the pro-peace candidate, mused about how former Rep. Liz Cheney, one of his harshest conservative Republican critics would be fine in a war zone with guns “pointed at their faces.”

This weekend brought a number of bizarre moments. On Sunday, Trump told NBC that Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s recent post on X about removing fluoride from public waters if Trump is re-elected “sounds fine to me.”

“Well, I haven’t talked to him about it yet, but it sounds fine to me,” Trump told NBC. “You know, it’s possible.”

And a night earlier in North Carolina, Trump laughed approvingly at an audience member’s suggestion that Vice President Kamala Harris worked as a prostitute. After Trump again insisted that Harris didn’t work at McDonald’s when she was younger, a supporter in Greensboro shouted, “She worked on a corner!”

Trump laughed, paused for a moment, then declared: “This place is incredible.”

As the crowd laughed, he added, “Remember, it’s other people saying it, not me.”

His reaction to the crude remark underscored how the rot in American political discourse, a long-running spiral, kicked into high gear after Trump’s arrival on the presidential campaign trail in 2015. It’s a contrast to seven years earlier, when a John McCain supporter said during a campaign rally that Barack Obama had lied about his identity, claiming, “He’s an Arab,” and the then-GOP nominee took the microphone away from her out of hand and emphasized that his rival was “a decent family man (and) citizen, which is just me.” There just happen to be differences of opinion on fundamental issues.”

But even then, Trump was lurking. He would soon become a leading proponent of the “Birther” conspiracy theory, a racist narrative that claimed Obama was not born in the United States.

Ahead of this year’s election, Trump has used the former president’s full name – Barack Hussein Obama – to demonize him. He frequently mispronounces Harris’ first name, despite showing it before he knows how to pronounce it correctly, and calls her a “shitty vice president.”

At other times, Trump descended into farce. During a rally in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, last month, he spent some time remembering the naked body of the late golf great Arnold Palmer.

“Arnold Palmer was a pure man, and I say that with all due respect to women, I love women,” Trump said. “This man was strong and tough, and I refused to say it, but when he was showering with the other pros when they came out there, they said, ‘Oh my God.’ This is unbelievable.’”

Trump’s message to – and more often to – women has also become increasingly bizarre. At a rally in Green Bay, Wisconsin, last week, he told the crowd that his staff had asked him to stop saying he was the “protector” of American women, in part because they recognized it as inappropriate.

“’Sir, please don’t say that,’” Trump said he was advised. “Why? I’m president. I want to protect the women of our country. Well, I’m going to do it whether the women like it or not.”

Recent polls have shown the former president trailing Harris significantly among female voters across all demographic lines. Neither Trump nor his allies have pushed back the numbers, instead urging more men to vote.

“The early vote was disproportionately female,” said Charlie Kirk, the leader of a right-wing group that has entrusted Trump with managing much of his political activity. “If men stay at home, Kamala is president. It’s that simple.”

Harris has largely countered Trump’s dire overtures with a promise to end the tribal conflicts that have characterized most of the last decade.

“Our democracy does not require us to agree on everything. That’s not the American way,” Harris said last week during a speech at the Ellipse in Washington, D.C. “We like a good debate. And the fact that someone has a different opinion than us does not make them an “enemy within.” They are family, neighbors, classmates, colleagues.”

“It can be easy to forget a simple truth,” she added. “It doesn’t have to be like this.”

The vice president has also focused on Trump’s attacks on rivals and critics, insisting he wants to use the power of the federal government to punish them. In contrast, Harris likes to say, she’s focused on policy, such as the push to restore federal abortion rights after the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision overturning Roe v. Wade was lifted.

“On day one, if Donald Trump were elected, he would walk into his office with a list of enemies,” Harris said in Washington. “If elected, I will come in with a to-do list full of priorities about what I will do for the American people.”