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- Donald Trump visited a McDonald’s in a key Pennsylvania county on Sunday.
- Kamala Harris said she once worked at a McDonald’s, which is a key part of her biography.
- Trump has repeatedly claimed, without evidence, that Harris did not work at McDonald’s.
Former President Donald Trump has long been known for his love of the Golden Arches.
After landing at the Philadelphia International Airport on Sunday, Trump and his team traveled to a McDonald’s franchise in Feasterville-Trevose, Pennsylvania, where he donned an official employee apron and began handing out orders to customers waiting in the drive-thru line. He also helped cook the restaurant’s signature fries.
Trump’s visit, however, had little to do with his fondness for the food.
For weeks, Trump has attempted to sow doubt — without providing evidence — that Vice President Kamala Harris ever worked at McDonald’s, which has become a key part of her biography.
Harris said she worked the cash register and made fries during the summer of 1983. At the time, Harris was an undergraduate at Howard University, and her campaign says she worked at a McDonald’s in Alameda, California, a city in the San Francisco Bay Area.
The former president said in Detroit on Friday that Harris “lied about working at McDonald’s.”
Trump senior advisor Jason Miller also cast doubt on Harris’ McDonald’s employment on Saturday, telling reporters that Trump was going to the restaurant “so that one candidate in this race could have actually worked at McDonald’s.”
Trump needled Harris again on Sunday. While at the drive-thru window, he said he worked at McDonald’s for “15 minutes more than Kamala” and once again accused her of never having worked at the chain.
Harris has firmly pushed back against Trump’s accusation.
The Harris campaign has promoted the vice president’s experience at McDonald’s as a part of a middle-class upbringing that might resonate with millions of Americans — and that separates her from the affluent life led by Trump.
“When Trump feels desperate, all he knows how to do is lie,” Harris campaign spokesman Ian Sams told The New York Times. “He can’t understand what it’s like to have a summer job because he was handed millions on a silver platter, only to blow it.”
Harris and Trump remain locked in a historically tight race. Trump has sought to promote his handling of the economy, an issue he used to his advantage when President Joe Biden was the presumptive Democratic nominee.
But when Biden exited the race in July, and Harris became the nominee, she quickly went to battle with Trump on the economy and succeeded in eroding his once huge advantage on the issue in key swing states.
McDonald’s, which is headquartered in Chicago, is the world’s largest fast-food chain, with more than 40,000 locations. The chain plans to have 50,000 locations around the globe by the end of 2027, according to its company website.
McDonald’s is also a major employer. In Pennsylvania alone, the company says its franchises employ over 25,000 people. In a statement provided to Business Insider on Sunday, the owner of the McDonald’s location that Trump visited said he was honored to “showcase” the restaurant chain.
“As a small, independent business owner, it is a fundamental value of my organization that we proudly open our doors to everyone who visits the Feasterville community. That’s why I accepted former President Trump’s request to observe the transformative working experience that 1 in 8 Americans have had: a job at McDonald’s,” Derek Giacomantonio said.
“As a former crew member, I can attest this job is more than burgers and fries, but a meaningful pathway to opportunity.”
Trump’s appetite for McDonald’s — and other fast food chains — has been well documented.
After winning the requisite number of GOP delegates needed to secure the party’s 2016 presidential nomination, Trump was photographed eating a McDonald’s Big Mac on his private jet.
And in January 2019, Trump hosted the college championship-winning Clemson University football team at the White House, where he ordered an assortment of fast-food staples from McDonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s, and Domino’s Pizza for the players.
Business Insider reached out to the Trump and Harris campaigns for comment.