Trump to focus on crime, immigration and China to rehabilitate his standing

President Donald Trump and his top aides are planning to rev up their campaign machine in the coming days with an aggressive focus on voters' perceived fears about crime, China and immigration - invoking parts of their successful 2016 strategy as they try to regain ground lost in recent months.

Beset by poor polling in key states such as Arizona, Ohio, Florida and Georgia, the campaign intends to attack former vice president Joe Biden far more vociferously and hopes to cast Democrats as too far to the left of swing voters, according to fivepeople familiar with the planning. Some progressives' calls to "defund the police" also will figure prominently into the campaign this week as a way to paint the Democratic ticket as too liberal for centrist and independent voters, an official said.

"They will draw a very clear contrast between Biden, Pelosi, Schumer and where Trump would take the country," said former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, a longtime Trump ally. "When Democrats run out and say we want to defund the police but not really, well, we'll let Biden explain where he is on that issue."