Trump Descends Upon New York City and Madison Square Garden ...

Madison Square Garden, the iconic venue known for Knicks basketball games and Billy Joel concerts, will host Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump tonight in deep-blue New York City. With Election Day just over a week away, more than 40 million voters have already weighed in on whose vision of America they hope prevails.

Trump’s choice of venue—in a solidly Democratic city in a state that hasn’t gone red since electing Ronald Reagan—appears to have more to do with gaining media attention, bringing in big fundraising numbers, and staking a kind of claim on the former president’s birthplace than changing hearts and minds.

The city has amped up security presence around the “World's Most Famous Arena," where eager supporters have been outside since before sunrise.

“It’s the New York, but it’s also, you know, it’s MSG, it’s Madison Square Garden,” Trump said during a recent FOX News Radio interview. “Guys like you and I, that means a lot, those words. Madison Square Garden, right? Don’t you think so? ... It’s a very big stop.”

Joining Trump on stage, according to a lineup the campaign provided, is a star-studded cast of MAGA loyalists who are all in. This group—ranging from elected officials to personal friends of Trump—have been instrumental in maintaining his campaign, defending his increasingly inflammatory remarks, and pushing right-wing ideology into seemingly every corner of the internet. While some of tonight’s speakers hold personal, political, and professional relationships with the former president, they also represent particular spheres of influence in the ever-evolving MAGA Republican Party.

Here’s a look at the who’s who for tonight:

ELECTED OFFICIALS

After spending the morning on Sunday’s news shows, Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance will be at MSG tonight. He’s joined by Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, who recently claimed that Trump’s medical records are “irrelevant.”

Other House representatives, Elise Stefanik of upstate New York and Byron Donalds of Southwest Florida, will also speak. Stefanik has gone from a moderate to a MAGA spokeswoman, giving an impassioned speech at the 2020 GOP Convention about “the Democrats’ baseless and illegal impeachment sham and the media’s endless obsession with it.” Donalds was reportedly on the phone with Trump when he got the news that the classified documents case had been dismissed, noting that he personally thought the case was “insane.”

FORMER AND CURRENT TRUMP ADMINISTRATION

Former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani, who has had a lot of Ls recently, will be at MSG today. After Trump lost to President Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election, he chose Giuliani to head the legal efforts challenging the results. As a result of his actions in pursuit of that goal, Giuliani has been ordered by a federal judge to turn over, as Vanity Fair’s Bess Levin put it, “Basically All Earthly Possessions to Election Workers He Defamed.”

Dan Scavino, who served in the Trump administration as White House deputy chief of staff for communications and director of social media from 2017 to 2021, is speaking, too. Scavino, according to reporting from the New York Times, was instrumental in handling Trump’s Twitter account throughout some of his most controversial moments on the platform. (Scaviano and Trump first met in 1990 when he was a teenage caddy at a golf course, where he got a $200 tip from the then-developer, who told the young man, “You are going to work for me one day.”)

Joining them is Stephen Miller, known for shaping immigration policies like family separation, the Muslim ban, and ending the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program (more on him here). Brooke Rollins, a former aide, is “the little-known operative planning Trump’s second term,” per Politico Magazine reporter Ian Ward. Rollins co-founded the America First Policy Institute, a pro-Trump think tank, in 2021. And, Howard Lutnick, the Wall Street CEO heading up Trump’s transition operation. According to some Trump insiders, Lutnick has reportedly tried to sideline past Trump administration people in favor of new individuals who could be personally beneficial to him.

CAMPAIGN ALL-STARS

An all-over-the-place coalition of high-profile names has been key to Trump’s campaigning breadth across the country. Some of these people are speaking tonight.

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., who ended his presidential bid to back Trump, has joined 2020 Democratic presidential hopeful Tulsi Gabbard on the trail, campaigning together in Omaha, Nebraska, last weekend. Kennedy—whose campaign included a sexual assault allegation first reported by Vanity Fair, previously called Trump a “terrible president” and a “bully,” while Gabbard referred to the now MSG-headliner as “corrupt” and “unfit to serve.”

Elon Musk, who has been giving swing state voters who pledge to support the First and Second Amendments a million dollars each through his political action organization America PAC, has also been a frequent flier on the campaign trail. An election law expert called the stunt “vote buying.” The billionaire head of X, Tesla, and SpaceX hosted back-to-back events in Pennsylvania, and will be a speaker tonight.

FAMILY AND FRIENDS

Multiple members of Trump’s family will grace the stage at MSG tonight, including his sons Donald Jr. and Eric, and Eric’s wife and Republican National Committee co-chair Lara Trump.

Lara has “emerged as one of the GOP’s rising stars,” according to her write-up on the TIME100 Next list. “She’s helped the party raise hundreds of millions of dollars; played a key role in persuading Trump to embrace voting by mail, something he spurned in 2020; and delivered a keynote address at the Republican National Convention.”

Friends of the former president also fill the lineup, like the CEO of Ultimate Fighting Championship, Dana White. White was the final speaker at the RNC before Trump accepted the GOP nomination, saying, “The mainstream media likes to push the narrative that he doesn’t care about anyone but himself. I absolutely know that’s not the truth because I’ve been friends with this guy for 25 years.”

Steve Witkoff is a New York real estate investor and longtime friend of Trump’s, who was golfing with the former president during the second failed assassination attempt. Witkoff was the first witness Trump’s lawyers called in the New York attorney general’s $250 million fraud case.

Another real estate businessman is slated to speak: Grant Cardone, who, along with his wife, set up a GoFundMe account to help pay for Trump’s civil fraud fine. Finishing off this category is David Rem, a childhood friend of former President Trump whose post on X about the MSG rally reads, “What an ULTRA MAGA LIST OF SPEAKERS ON STEROIDS! As I ⁩am the lone UNKNOWN, please say hi. TY.”

MEDIA AND ENTERTAINERS

Last week, former Fox News host Tucker Carlson likened Trump to a father coming home to give a “hormone-addled 15-year-old” daughter (who is America in this analogy) a “vigorous spanking.” He’ll also be speaking tonight. During his address at the RNC, Carlson called Trump “the funniest person I’ve ever met in my life,” and suggested that “the entire Trump project” is “to return democracy to the United States.”

Podcast host Tony Hinchcliffe, known as Kill Tony, and radio personality Sid Rosenberg are on the lineup, too. It was on Rosenberg’s show where Trump said “Any Jewish person that voted for” Harris or Biden “should have their head examined.” Adding, “If you love Israel — or if you’re Jewish, because a lot of Jewish people do not like Israel … If you’re Jewish, if you vote for a Democrat, you’re a fool, an absolute fool.”