‘Really big news’: What to know about Trump’s primetime speech on Thursday

United States President Donald Trump is promising “really big news” in a rare primetime address on Thursday night, though he won’t say exactly what it is.

The surprise speech was announced on Tuesday. But when pressed by reporters about what he planned to talk about, Trump only revealed that the speech would be about elections and “a couple of other things”.
“It doesn’t get bigger, because without free and fair elections, you don’t have a country,” he told journalists in the Oval Office on Tuesday.

Asked to elaborate, Trump said he wanted to “save it” for the speech.

“We’ll be discussing other things, too,” he added. “It’s going to be a very big announcement.”

The White House has since confirmed that the address will focus on elections, including information related to the 2020 presidential election, which Trump has falsely claimed he won.

The speech is also expected to discuss what the White House describes as vulnerabilities in US voting machines.

Here’s what we know about the upcoming primetime presidential address.

When is Trump’s speech?
Trump is expected to speak from the White House on Thursday at 9pm US Eastern Time (01:00 GMT Friday).

How can you watch it?
Major US television networks are expected to carry the address live. The Trump administration has requested airtime from major broadcasters.

It will also be livestreamed on WhiteHouse.gov and on the White House’s YouTube page.

Why is the timing significant?
Trump’s speech comes three and a half months before the November 3 midterm elections.
At stake is control over the US Congress. Currently, Trump’s Republican Party holds slim majorities in both of Congress’s chambers.

But Democrats are seeking to tip the balance in their favour, leveraging backlash to Trump’s second term.

Critics fear Trump may use his primetime address to erode voter confidence in the upcoming elections, or to assert federal influence over election administration, which is run at the state and local level.

There is also speculation that Trump may be angling to fire up his base amid drooping poll numbers. The research firm YouGov suggested this month that more than 57 percent of US voters disapprove of the president’s second-term performance so far.

What is Trump expected to talk about?
So far, much remains unknown about Thursday’s speech.

Administration officials say Trump will discuss newly declassified intelligence connected to its investigations into the 2020 presidential election.

They have also suggested that Trump will discuss alleged vulnerabilities in voting machines that could allow foreign cyber intrusions.

Trump has revealed little else. When asked this week whether the speech would focus on voting machine integrity, he replied simply: “It will concern that subject.”

What happened in the 2020 elections?
Trump was a first-term incumbent when he ran for a second term in the 2020 presidential election.

He faced Democratic nominee Joe Biden, who had previously served as vice president under Barack Obama.

Biden defeated Trump, winning both the Electoral College vote – which determines the presidency – and the popular vote, an important symbolic metric.

The Democrat scooped up 306 Electoral College votes and more than 81 million individual ballots, compared with 232 Electoral College votes and 74 million ballots for Trump.

Critically, swing states like Georgia, Michigan and Arizona voted in Biden’s favour.

After the election, Trump repeatedly rejected the results, and his supporters attacked the US Capitol during the Electoral College certification on January 6, 2021.

What is Trump’s history of questioning US elections?
Trump has spent years casting doubt on the integrity of US elections, even before 2020.

Before the 2016 election, he refused to say whether he would accept a loss to Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.

After winning his first term in office, he created a presidential commission to investigate his claims that he lost the popular vote due to widespread fraud. The commission was disbanded after finding no evidence to support those claims.