Trump Daytona Rally Live: Doors Open at the Ocean Center, Rep. Fine Attacks Democrats Onstage, Seats Still Empty at 6:30

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - The doors of the Ocean Center opened at 3:30 p.m. Eastern on Friday for President Donald Trump's final Florida rally of the midterm campaign, four days before Election Day. The hall holds 9,300 people. Supporters - some in line since 3:30 a.m., when Ormond Beach resident Annette Tsoukalas arrived to be first - passed through security checkpoints from 5:30 p.m. and filled the seats around the main stage, while protesters gathered along Atlantic Avenue on the building's east side holding signs critical of the president. The Federal Aviation Administration restricted flights for a 30-nautical-mile radius around Ormond Beach Municipal Airport, where the president was expected to land, from 5 to 11 p.m.

The pre-program brought the evening's first hard-edged remarks. Rep. Randy Fine took the stage shortly before 6:44 p.m. and attacked Democrats in Congress. 'Many of the Democrats in Congress, they hate America,' Fine said. 'It isn't that they have a different vision for this country. It is their goal to seek our destruction.' Fine named Reps. Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, and said he would file a motion to expel Omar from Congress 'if the evidence shows' that she is not a citizen of the United States. Omar, a naturalized citizen who has represented Minnesota in Congress since 2019, was born in Somalia; Fine offered no evidence for the premise in the remarks the News-Journal reported.

The hometown paper also recorded the room itself. At 6:30 p.m., with an hour left until Trump was expected on stage at 7 p.m., its photos showed plenty of still-empty seats in the 9,300-seat convention center. Trump is stumping for gubernatorial candidate Byron Donalds and U.S. Sen. Ashley Moody, the same Florida ticket he backed in Fort Myers a week ago. His own remarks - the speech this rally exists for - file tonight on verified remarks.