Donald Trump heaped praise on the state of North Carolina before vehemently criticizing the state, just two minutes later, during a rally supporting Michael Whatley’s Senate campaign on Wednesday.
Trump took to the stage in Gastonia and told the audience:
“Well, hello, North Carolina, Special place. This is a special place. I love it. I love it.”
The president said he was “thrilled to be back in this incredible and beautiful state with thousands of proud, hardworking American patriots. You’re incredible. You built this country.”
Trump told supporters he was there to back Whatley, a former Republican National Committee co-chair and former chair of the North Carolina GOP, in his race against Democratic rival Roy Cooper, a former North Carolina governor, attorney general and state representative.
But he then pulled a full 180 on his view of the Tar Heel State.
“So, nobody used to think of North Carolina as a dangerous state, criminally dangerous. It was like, North Carolina, it was beautiful. It was apple pie, right?” he said.
“And now it’s one of the most violent and one of the worst in the whole nation,” Trump continued, a characterization not supported by the latest available FBI crime data.
“And it all started with Cooper. And you have a lousy governor right now too, but it started with Cooper,” Trump added, again attacking Cooper, who governed the state from 2017 until 2025.