Insights from Donald Trump's return to the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee

In what could be his final walk through Wisconsin before Tuesday's election, former President Donald Trump returned to the arena in Milwaukee where he formally accepted the Republican Party's presidential nomination just a few months ago.

Trump told his supporters at the Fiserv Forum on Friday evening that if elected, America will be “bigger, better, bolder, richer, safer and stronger than ever before.”

Just in July, Trump took the stage at the Fiserv Forum during the Republican National Convention to formally accept the party's nomination during the four-day event.

Vice President Kamala Harris then took over the RNC venue for her own rally during the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in August.

And on Friday, Harris held a rival rally and concert just six miles away at the Wisconsin State Fair Exposition Center.

Trump and Harris each hope to win this battleground state in the fight for the White House.

Here are some takeaways from Trump's rally in Milwaukee:

Trump criticizes economy, labor market report

Trump called the latest jobs report “pathetic” and said the economy “stinks.”

The jobs report showed that hiring slowed significantly as employers added just 12,000 jobs in October. Two hurricanes in the Southeast and several worker strikes were expected to reduce the total, but it was still much lower than expected, USA TODAY reported.

The unemployment rate remained stable at 4.1%, the Labor Department said Friday.

He also supported tariffs — taxes the government imposes when foreign goods enter the U.S. — saying it was “the most beautiful word in the entire dictionary.”

“You’re going to get so rich with the word inch,” he told the crowd.

Economists say tariffs would lead to higher prices for consumers.

Microphone problem annoys Trump: “I’m busting my ass with this stupid microphone”

Trump pulled the microphone from the stand relatively early in his speech when people in the audience said they couldn't hear him.

He ended up holding the microphone and after a while he started complaining that it was heavy.

“You want to see me destroy the people backstage? …I'm seething up here. “I’m busting my ass with this stupid microphone,” Trump said. “I'm blowing out my left arm, now I'm blowing out my right arm and I'm blowing out my fucking throat too because of these stupid people.”

His discussion about the microphone problem went on for a while, during which he also suggested that the microphone stand was too low. At some point he seemed to get bored of holding it.

RFK Jr. tells Trump supporters as they vote: 'Don't vote for me'

Former independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. urged Trump supporters to cast their votes for Trump, not him.

Kennedy, who dropped out of the presidential race in August and endorsed Trump, is still on the ballot in Wisconsin and Michigan.

He sued to withdraw from the Wisconsin ballot in early September, but Wisconsin law says anyone who files nomination papers and qualifies to be on the ballot — which Kennedy did — cannot reject the nomination.

Republicans fear he could steal votes away from Trump in Wisconsin and Michigan, two key battleground states.

“When you go to the voting booth on Tuesday, you will see my name on the ballot,” he said. “I don’t want your vote. I want you to vote for Donald Trump.”

Trump falsely claims he won Wisconsin twice

Trump claimed he won Wisconsin twice, although he actually only won the battleground state in the 2016 presidential election, not 2020.

“I won it despite your difficulties,” he said of 2016. “I actually won it twice, but those are small things.”

In 2020, voters handed President Joe Biden a victory by about 21,000 votes after electing Trump by a similar margin just four years earlier. The state's 2020 election results were confirmed by recounts paid for by Trump, court rulings, a bipartisan state audit and a study by a prominent conservative group.

Like at the RNC, the crowd mimics Trump's look

At the RNC, supporters wore earflaps made of gauze, cotton or napkins similar to those worn by Trump at the convention after he survived an assassination attempt in Pennsylvania just days earlier.

Trump remembered the patch he wore on Friday.

“We had a little event here, you know. … That was Congress,” he said via the Fiserv Forum, adding that he was “a little embarrassed to go out with a patch.”

On Friday, in addition to their distinctive red hats, some supporters wore yellow or orange safety vests, an imitation of the reflective vest Trump wore to a rally near Green Bay on Wednesday.

The vest was intended to highlight President Joe Biden's apparent reference to Trump supporters as “garbage” in response to comedian Tony Hinchcliffe calling Puerto Rico a “floating island of trash” at a Trump rally in New York on Sunday.

Biden and the White House quickly sought to clarify that Biden was specifically referring to Hinchcliffe. Harris also distanced himself from Biden's remark.

Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson criticizes Trump before rally at Fiserv Forum

In a statement from Harris' campaign, Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson recalled Trump's remarks to the RNC in which he called Milwaukee a “terrible city.”

“Donald Trump calls us a 'terrible' city and spends every visit here complaining about his own problems rather than proposing solutions that will make our lives better,” Johnson said. “That’s not what Milwaukee and Wisconsin are about.”

Johnson, a Democrat and vocal supporter of the vice president, said Harris will “fight for all of us and lay out a hopeful, more optimistic vision for the future.”

Lawrence Andrea of the Journal Sentinel contributed to this story.

Alison Dirr can be reached at [email protected].