By Stephanie Kelly, James Oliphant
(Reuters) -With millions of U.S. voters already heading to the polls, Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris on Wednesday will seek support from undecided voters at a televised town hall in battleground Pennsylvania, while Republican Donald Trump sweeps through Georgia.
More than 23 million voters have cast ballots, either through in-person early voting or mail-in ballots, according to tracking data from the Election Lab at the University of Florida.
Several states, including the battlegrounds of North Carolina and Georgia, set records on their respective first day of early voting.
The robust early turnout comes as Vice President Harris and former President Trump remain neck and neck in the seven most competitive states with less than two weeks to go until the Nov. 5 election.
Trump had two stops planned in Georgia on Wednesday, first at a religious-themed “believers and ballots” event in Zebulon and later a rally in Duluth with former Fox News star Tucker Carlson and former independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Trump in recent days has sought to rally turnout from Christian evangelicals, hoping they will set aside any concerns about his frequent off-color commentary like his tale about Arnold Palmer’s anatomy.
Harris will participate in a CNN town hall in Chester Township, Pennsylvania, an attempt to persuade the dwindling number of undecided voters to support her and help turn the tide in a closely divided race where even a small percentage of votes could be critical.
Harris tried and failed to push Trump to agree to a second presidential debate on CNN after she was considered to have won the first and only presidential debate between the two candidates, which took place in September on ABC News.
Pennsylvania and Georgia are among the seven battleground states that will decide who wins the presidency, and both candidates are likely to spend much of the rest of their campaigns visiting them.
Harris held a marginal 46% to 43% lead nationally over the former president in the latest Reuters/Ipsos poll.
Allies campaigning for Trump and Harris also are fanning out across the United States this week. Harris’ vice presidential pick, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, will travel to North Carolina and Pennsylvania after campaigning with Democratic former President Barack Obama in Wisconsin on Tuesday.
Trump’s running mate JD Vance will head to Reno, Nevada, on Wednesday.
(Reporting by Stephanie Kelly and James Oliphant; Writing by Steve Holland; Editing by Colleen Jenkins, Lincoln Feast and Jonathan Oatis)
