Is he a political genius or just off his rocker? At least some Americans are seriously grappling with that question as former president Donald Trump comes closer to his goal of returning to the White House.
Latest opinion polls show that it is Democrat Kamala Harris who is losing momentum less than two weeks before the Nov 5 election.
And this is despite the fact that Trump, the Republican candidate in the final campaign of his career, appears to follow no playbook at all.
He confounds critics, and probably his own campaign, when he wants to play music instead of scoring political points on the campaign trail.
When two members of the audience fainted during Trump's packed town hall in the battleground state of Pennsylvania on Oct 14, he paused the proceedings. "Let's just listen to music. Who the hell wants to hear questions, right?" he said, in what seemed to be a spur-of-the-moment episode.
Without objections from the crowd, he spent the next 40 minutes swaying to songs he picked, including Ave Maria, a Catholic prayer.
His communications director Steven Cheung called it Trump's unique approach to politics, posting on social media platform X: "@realDonaldTrump is unlike any politician in history, and it's great."
Ms Harris posted the video of Trump, drily saying: "Hope he's okay."
The Trump campaign, surprisingly disciplined in other aspects, seems to have accepted the limits of its influence on the candidate.
It has crafted a catch-all line - "letting Trump be Trump" - to explain the deviation from the norm.
Four days later, at another rally in the same swing state, Trump was again being himself.
Appearing on stage to give the closing argument for his candidacy, he strayed into a story about local hero Arnold Palmer that included an off-colour comment about the late golf legend.
This story is from the October 26, 2024 edition of The Straits Times.
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This story is from the October 26, 2024 edition of The Straits Times.
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