Donald Trump has watched from the sidelines as Vice-President Kamala Harris galvanised and re-energised Democrats by stepping in as their likely US presidential nominee, but he is about to get back in the game.
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Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, on Wednesday will hold his first campaign rally since Harris emerged as his near-certain Democratic foe in the 2024 election.
The former president will appear at an event in Charlotte, North Carolina, a state that will be an important battleground in the November 5 election.
The Trump campaign has insisted it is prepared for Harris' candidacy, arguing she serves as a proxy for President Joe Biden on the economic and immigration policies that contributed to his sinking popularity with voters.
A Reuters-Ipsos poll released on Tuesday showed the changed race to be in a statistical dead heat.
The poll, taken in the two days since Biden decided to stand down from re-election, showed Harris with a two-percentage-point lead over Trump, 44 per cent to 42 per cent.
Other recent national polls have shown Trump with an advantage.
Biden, who returned to Washington after isolating at his home in Delaware with COVID-19, will address the nation on Wednesday night to explain his reasons for dropping out of the race on Sunday after intense pressure from his party.
On Tuesday, Trump took the unusual step of speaking to reporters on a conference call to underscore his campaign's line of attack on the border, saying Harris was partially responsible for a record flow of migrants.
Biden put Harris in charge of working with countries in Central America to help stem the tide of migration, but she was not made responsible for border security.
"She's a radical left person, and this country doesn't want a radical left person to destroy it," Trump said on the call.
"She wants open borders. She wants things that nobody wants."
Harris has not called for the removal of border controls.
Harris on Wednesday will head to Indianapolis to speak at an event hosted by the Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, which was founded at Howard University, the historically Black college that Harris attended.
Harris held an energetic first rally as the likely nominee on Tuesday in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, which hosted the Republican National Convention last week.
She assailed Trump and said he would take the nation "backward".
"Do we want to live in a country of freedom, compassion and rule of law, or a country of chaos, fear and hate?" she asked the crowd.
Democrats will formally nominate their new ticket at August's convention in Chicago.
Harris and her campaign have worked at a breakneck pace to consolidate support among Democrats in Congress and delegates across the country, and have raised more than $US100 million ($A150 million) since Sunday.
Trump, coming off a triumphant week in which his party unified around his presidential bid after a failed assassination attempt two weekends ago, has had to watch as Biden's sudden departure from the race dramatically shifted the narrative and sparked a surge of attention towards Harris at his expense.
Australian Associated Press
