Three days before New York votes, Donald Trump got on the phone and made his final pitch. On Saturday night, the president headlined a tele-rally β one of those campaign calls that pipes a voice into thousands of kitchens and car rides at once β and used it to beg New Yorkers to vote for Bruce Blakeman for governor on Tuesday. The Trump Blakeman Hochul contest, as the president framed it, is not just another race. It is, in his telling, a rescue mission.
βWeβre winning,β he insisted, despite polls saying otherwise. And he saved his sharpest language for the woman heβs trying to unseat.
A Hail-Mary call for Blakeman
Trump has not been subtle about where he stands in the New York governorβs race, but Saturdayβs call was the closing argument. Blakeman, the Nassau County executive running as the Republican nominee, has leaned all the way into the Trump brand from the start of his campaign. βBlakeman β¦ started with the promise to βbring Trump-style leadership to Albany,ββ noted Hochul spokesperson Ryan Radulovack β and his closing message, the spokesman added, tells voters βhow little he regrets going full Trump in this campaign.β
Trump returned the embrace. He described Blakeman as a longtime friend and a proven manager, pointing to his record in Nassau County. βAnybody that can do what he did in politics and get resounding results, and not only that, he has the safest county in the United States of America [according to US News & World Report] β¦ Heβs a great manager.β
The president even dangled a promise of federal largesse if his man wins. βIβll be waiting for his call,β Trump said. βI bet heβs going to be one of the first calls if he wins, and heβll get tremendous help from the federal government. And itβs hard to help people that do such a bad job. Itβs almost like throwing good money after bad.β
The βworst governorβ broadside
The heart of the call, though, was the attack on the incumbent. Trump accused Gov. Kathy Hochul of βfailed and incompetentβ leadership, then went further.
βKathy Hochul may be the worst governor in the history of New York State and one of the worst in the nation,β Trump declared during the rally, in remarks reported by the New York Post. βShe been a disaster, and I can tell you that Bruce has been a friend of mine for a long time.β
It is classic Trump: personal, superlative, and aimed at the gut. Hochulβs campaign answered in kind. Radulovack tried to flip the script by casting the president himself as the thing New Yorkers should fear, a βboogeymanβ move the governor has leaned on throughout the campaign. And the campaignβs counter-message was policy, not personality: βGov. Hochul has put money back in New Yorkersβ pockets, invested $4 billion in public safety, and fought back against Trumpβs attacks,β Radulovack said β while Blakeman, he argued, βdefends everything Trump does.β
The numbers, meanwhile, are the elephant on the call. Recent polls have Hochul ahead by anywhere from 11 to 14 points β Sienaβs likely-voter survey put her at 54% to Blakemanβs 40%, with Marist finding a similar 53% to 42% spread, according to reporting this week. Trump acknowledged none of it and simply predicted a Blakeman win.
Blakeman himself has been running the same play. When rapper Nicki Minaj β who has become one of Trumpβs most vocal celebrity supporters β backed him this week and called Hochul an βevil woman,β Blakeman welcomed her on social media: βNicki, Iβve got the U-Haul ready. Itβs time to fire the worst governor in America.β Hochul, for her part, brushed it off at an Albany campaign stop: βIβm not evil. Iβm nice. Iβm nice.β
The down-ballot asks
The governorβs race wasnβt the only name on Trumpβs call sheet. The president also used the tele-rally to promote Republican attorney general candidate Saritha Komatireddy and upstate congressional hopeful Anthony Constantino, folding both into the Saturday pitch.
That matters because Tuesday isnβt just about Albany. The midterm elections will decide control of Congress for the final two years of Trumpβs second term, and every down-ballot Republican race in a blue state like New York is part of the same national fight. Trumpβs willingness to spend his Saturday night on a phone call for a House hopeful in upstate New York β not exactly a marquee TV slot β shows how seriously the White House is treating the map.
The Iran aside
Then came the part of the call that had nothing to do with New York at all. Midway through a get-out-the-vote appeal, Trump veered into foreign policy and claimed that the war with Iran is all but over.
βWeβre winning very easily the war with Iran,β Trump said. βTheyβre talking to us. Theyβre negotiating, but they do a lot of talking. And weβll see what happens.β
He didnβt stop there. βBut one way or the other, their Navyβs gone. Their Air Force is gone. All blown up. All at the bottom of the sea, and theyβre not going to have a nuclear weapon. Itβs very simple, and they know that. They know that, and we can end it any time we want.β
It was a striking claim to drop into a state-level campaign call β a victory declaration, delivered almost as an afterthought, three days before voters head to the polls.
Whatβs at stake on Tuesday in the Trump Blakeman Hochul showdown
Strip away the theatrics and the Trump Blakeman Hochul showdown comes down to a simple question: can a Republican win statewide in New York in 2026? Hochul is seeking a second full term, and the polls say she is cruising. The Blakeman campaignβs bet β shared by the president β is that the polls are wrong, that anger over crime, costs, and the stateβs direction will carry a Trump-aligned Republican over the line in a state that hasnβt elected a Republican governor in two decades.
Trumpβs closing message to his supporters was, in effect, a dare to believe it. Vote for Blakeman, he said, and New York gets βtremendous help from the federal government.β Vote for Hochul, and you get more of what he calls a disaster.
New Yorkers decide on Tuesday, November 3.