Kamala Harris Launches Her Campaign for President

HOUSTON (AP) — The first change that stands out is the music, with President Joe Biden’s rock and Motown fading from the playlist in favor of more pop and hip hop.

Then comes Vice President Kamala Harris’ stump speech, devoid of Bidenesque rambling digressions and focused more on the future than a laundry list of past accomplishments.

In only a few days since taking over the campaign, Harris has put her distinctive stamp on the election operation. She’s raising excitement and drawing an outpouring of donations from Democrats who had feared they were sliding toward disaster with Biden at the top of the ticket.

Now, her challenge will be transforming that enthusiasm into a durable movement at hyperspeed. She still has to make hard choices about how to maximize her time on the trail, choose a running mate and develop a policy platform independent of Biden, while her opponents are eager to define her as unfit for the White House.

“This is the easiest week of the campaign for Harris,” warns Alex Conant, a Republican strategist. “It will not get better.”

Harris insists she’s ready.

On Thursday in Houston, she told Republicans to “bring it on” in “a fight for our most fundamental freedoms.”

As she hits the road, Harris’ most dependable applause line has been “we’re not going back.” She might be referring to Republican candidate Donald Trump, but it doubles as a pitch for the generational change that she’s offering.

Biden endorsed Harris as his successor with just 107 days left in the race, and Conant described her campaign as being “launched off an aircraft carrier.”

“It’s never been done before,” he said. “This is stuff that people usually spend years developing, and she’s doing it in days.”

Trump is revving up his attacks on Harris, calling her “bad news” and “a radical left, not very smart person” in an interview with Fox News on Thursday. Some Republicans have also suggested that Harris’ career has only advanced because of her identity; she’s the first woman, Black person and person of South Asian descent to serve as vice president.

Sen. Laphonza Butler, a California Democrat, says Harris is prepared for the extraordinary pressures of the campaign.

“She is clear eyed about the attacks that she is going to face,” Butler said. “But she’s also determined and confident in what leadership she can offer the Democratic Party and the American people.”

Democrats are happy with Harris’ early days, and they’re relieved that the transition from Biden has not devolved into painful infighting. Former President Barack Obama is preparing his own endorsement after being privately supportive of her candidacy, according to a person familiar with the matter who requested anonymity before an announcement.

“The party was ready to unite behind her,” said Anna Greenberg, a Democratic pollster. “If the opposite had happened, it would have been a complete disaster.”

Like Biden, Harris has struggled with low approval ratings. But her team argues that she’s well positioned to increase her support with young people, women and voters of color. If successful, she could compete more effectively in places like Georgia, Arizona and North Carolina, as opposed to just the “blue wall” states of Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan where Biden has been more focused.

There are dangers, too. Harris needs to avoid losing too much support among men, white people and older voters, which would erase her advantages with other parts of the electorate.

“People don’t know her that well,” said Celinda Lake, a Democratic pollster. “It’s a fight to define her.”

Republicans have a head start, at least when it comes to advertising. Trump and his allies are outspending Democrats by 25-to-1 on television and radio this week. However, Lake said Harris has one important thing going for her.

“Americans like the new shiny thing,” she said. “And Donald Trump is not new or shiny.”

Some Democrats are holding their breath, recalling how Harris’ campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination imploded four years ago before a single primary vote was cast. Her team was beset by infighting, and she failed to articulate a clear message in a crowded field of candidates.

More difficulty came after she became Biden’s running mate and took office alongside him. She struggled with staff turnover and muddled messaging.

Harris has to restore a sense of stability to a political operation that has been rocked by historic turbulence in the month since Biden’s shaky debate performance lit the fuse for his eventual decision to drop his reelection bid.

At campaign headquarters in Wilmington, Delaware, “Kamala” signs were swiftly printed and taped up on the walls next to “Biden Harris” ones.

Some of the campaign’s leadership — Jen O’Malley Dillon as chair and Julie Rodriguez as manager— are remaining in place. But Mike Donilon, a longtime Biden confidant, is stepping back from his original prominent role. It’s likely that Harris will expand the team with advisers of her own.

Harris visited Wilmington on Monday, the day after Biden announced he was dropping out. The staff cheered as she entered, and one woman appeared overcome with emotion, her eyes glistening.

“We’re on the right side of every single issue, and we have this team right here and thousands of others all around the country,” Harris told campaign workers who packed into a stuffy room to hear from their new candidate.

She spent the rest of the week tending to critical constituencies — battleground state voters near Milwaukee, Black women at a sorority conference in Indianapolis and union members at a teacher convention in Houston.

Sen. Tammy Baldwin, a Wisconsin Democrat, told reporters that Harris’ candidacy is “a new beginning for the party, a new beginning for the country.”

“This is really wonderful,” she added.

When Harris returned to Washington on Thursday afternoon, there were 103 days until the election.

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris on Thursday said she urged Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to reach a cease-fire deal soon with Hamas so that dozens of hostages held by the militants in Gaza since Oct. 7 can return home.

Harris said she had a “frank and constructive” conversation with Netanyahu in which she affirmed Israel’s right to defend itself but also expressed deep concern about the high death toll in Gaza over nine months of war and the “dire” humanitarian situation there.

With all eyes on the likely Democratic presidential nominee, Harris largely reiterated President Joe Biden’s longstanding message that it’s time to find an endgame to the brutal war in Gaza, where more than 39,000 Palestinians have died. Yet she offered a more forceful tone about the urgency of the moment just one day after Netanyahu gave a fiery speech to Congress in which he defended the war, vowed “total victory” against Hamas and made relatively scant mention of cease-fire negotiations.

“There has been hopeful movement in the talks to secure an agreement on this deal,” Harris told reporters shortly after meeting with Netanyahu. “And as I just told Prime Minister Netanyahu, it is time to get this deal done.”

Netanyahu met separately earlier in the day with Biden, who has also been calling on Israel and Hamas to come to an agreement on a U.S.-backed, three-phase deal to bring home remaining hostages and establish an extended cease-fire.

The White House said in a statement that Biden discussed with Netanyahu “the need to close the remaining gaps, finalize the deal as soon as possible, bring the hostages home, and reach a durable end to the war in Gaza.” Biden and Netanyahu also discussed improving the flow of aid into Gaza as well as the ongoing threat posed by Iranian-backed militant groups, including Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis.

Harris said after her meeting with Netanyahu that Israel’s war in Gaza is more complicated than simply being supportive of one side or the other.

“Too often, the conversation is binary when the reality is anything but,” Harris said.

Harris also condemned Hamas’ brutality. White House national security spokesperson John Kirby reiterated the administration position that the militant group that killed some 1,200 on Oct. 7 and kidnapped 250 people from Israel ultimately holds responsibility for the suffering in Gaza and must come to terms with Israel.

Kirby added that gaps between the two sides can be closed “but there are issues that need to be resolved that will require some leadership, some compromise.”

With Harris’ forceful comments, the administration also appeared to be stepping up pressure on the Israelis to not let the moment pass to get a deal done.

“What has happened in Gaza over the past nine months is devastating. The images of dead children and desperate, hungry people fleeing for safety, sometimes displaced for the second, third or fourth time,” Harris said. “We cannot look away in the face of these tragedies. We cannot allow ourselves to become numb to the suffering. And I will not be silent.”

Thousands protested Netanyahu’s visit in Washington, and Harris condemned those who were violent or used rhetoric that praised Hamas.

Netanyahu, last at the White House when former President Donald Trumpwas in office, is headed to Florida on Friday to meet with the Republican presidential nominee.

Ahead of the Harris-Netanyahu meeting Thursday, Trump said at a rally in North Carolina the vice president was “totally against the Jewish people.”

Harris has long spoken of her strong support for Israel. The first overseas trip of her Senate career in early 2017 was to Israel, and one of her first acts in office was to introduce a resolution opposing a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning Israel.

She’s also spoken of her personal ties to Israel, including memories of raising money as a child to plant trees in Israel and installing a mezuzah near the front door of the vice president’s residence in Washington — her husband is Jewish. She also has connections to pro-Israel groups including the conservative American Israel Public Affairs Committee and the liberal J Street.

For Harris, the meeting with Netanyahu was an opportunity to demonstrate that she has the mettle to serve as commander in chief. She’s being scrutinized by those on the political left who say Biden hasn’t done enough to force Netanyahu to end the war and by Republicans looking to brand her as insufficient in her support for Israel.

Harris’ last one-on-one engagement with Netanyahu was in March 2021, but she’s taken part in more than 20 calls between Biden and Netanyahu.

The conservative Likud Party leader Netanyahu and centrist Democrat Biden have had ups-and-downs over the years. Netanyahu, in what will likely be his last White House meeting with Biden, reflected on the roughly 40 years they’ve known each other and thanked the president for his service.

“From a proud Jewish Zionist to a proud Irish American Zionist, I want to thank you for 50 years of public service and 50 years of support for the state of Israel,” Netanyahu told Biden.

A U.S.-backed proposal to release remaining hostages in Gaza over three phases is something that would be a legacy-affirming achievement for Biden, who abandoned his reelection bid and endorsed Harris. It could also be a boon for Harris in her bid to succeed him.

Following their talks, Biden and Netanyahu met with the families of American hostages.

Jonathan Dekel-Chen, the father of hostage Sagui Dekel-Chen, said the families received an “ironclad commitment” from Biden and Netanyahu to get the hostages home. He said he was more hopeful than at anytime since Hamas released more than 100 hostages during a temporary cease-fire in November.

“There is more reason today than in any time since the last round of hostage releases that something can happen,” he said.

Netanyahu is trying to navigate his own delicate political moment. He faces pressure from the families of hostages demanding a cease-fire agreement to bring their loved ones home and from far-right members of his governing coalition who demand he resist any deal that could keep Israeli forces from eliminating Hamas.

In his speech to a joint session of Congress on Wednesday, Netanyahu offered a robust defense of Israel’s conduct during the war and lashed out against accusations by the International Criminal Court of Israeli war crimes. He made the case that Israel, in its fight against Iran-backed Hamas, was effectively keeping “Americans boots off the ground while protecting our shared interests in the Middle East.”

“Remember this: Our enemies are your enemies,” Netanyahu said. “Our fight, it’s your fight. And our victory will be your victory. ”

Netanyahu also derided protesters who massed near the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday, calling them Iran’s “useful idiots.”

Harris on Thursday said she was outraged that some protesters tagged areas near the U.S. Capitol with pro-Hamas graffiti, expressed support for the militants and burned a U.S. flag at Union Station.

“Pro-Hamas graffiti and rhetoric is abhorrent and we must not tolerate it in our nation,” Harris said in a statement. “I condemn the burning of the American flag. That flag is a symbol of our highest ideals as a nation and represents the promise of America. It should never be desecrated in that way.”

Protesters massed near the White House on Thursday chanted, “Arrest Netanyahu,” and brought an effigy of the prime minister with blood on its hands and wearing an orange jumpsuit. A small number of counterprotesters wore Israeli flags around their shoulders.

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hanimmal said:

I was curious to see how Harris lined up age-wise to the previous presidents. I saw some of the right wing trolls (like Gaetz I believe it was that I started to think it is the obvious troll they are testing out) about how she has no experience and it started to sound (or I could have just imagined it) that they were saying she is too young to try to sell Trump as the elder statesman.

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Prosecutor, elected state-wide as Attorney General and Senator in the what the 5th largest economy in the world, sat on all the important committees where we got to see her stand against the most powerful people in the world and make them nervous, and now 4 years as Vice President she was able to get a master class from Biden on the world stage.

I mean it is no tv reality gameshow experience, but hey nobodies perfect.

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Kamala Harris has range. She can grill nominees for the Supreme Court or meet with foreign dignitaries, then pivot to hosting a Diwali celebration or dancing enthusiastically alongside an HBCU-styled marching band.

It is a dexterity that Harris, the first Black woman and Asian American to serve as vice president, developed as a person of color to navigate the corridors of power or Main Street in a nation where race and identity influence how one is received or embraced.

Harris, the daughter of immigrants from Jamaica and India, is an adroit code-switcher, a term that can include deliberately adjusting one’s speech style and expression to optimize relatability and ensure she gets a message across.

Former President Donald Trump, during a contentious interview session at a meeting of the National Association of Black Journalists, showed no familiarity with the concept. He implied that Harris is inauthentic for embracing all aspects of her heritage. His failure to recognize code-switching also speaks to a prevailing belief that whiteness, often correlated with speaking in plainly enunciated English, is the default in our politics and democracy.

“We need to be celebrating our whole selves, which means we need to celebrate all of our identities,” said Christine Chen, co-founder and executive director of APIAVote, a nonpartisan civic engagement organization focused on the Asian American Pacific Islander community.

“The more that a candidate can embrace their multiple identities, I think that’s a way to connect with different communities and different people who identify on different issues that you stand on,” added Chen, who is Chinese American.

Trump, who falsely suggested to the annual gathering of Black journalists that the vice president has been misleading voters about her race, waded into murkier waters by insinuating Harris cannot be trusted because she “happened to turn Black” after she promoted her Indian heritage.

Harris doesn’t need to code-switch to prove she is a Black and Indian American woman; she was born that way.

Shereen Marisol Meraji, former co-host of the award-winning NPR podcast “Code Switch,” said Harris’ identity is layered and can still be challenging to navigate in a nation that once encouraged multiracial people to favor one identity over another.

“If you walk through the world as I have, where I’m trying very much to embrace both sides of myself, then it’s like you get put through these authenticity tests,” said Meraji, who is of Iranian and Puerto Rican heritage.

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An assistant professor of race and journalism at the University of California, Berkeley, Meraji added: “The ability to code-switch and go into different communities ... it is a huge asset. And I think for people who are in competition with Kamala Harris, it’s also quite threatening.”

Many politicians of color code-switch to ensure vital information is delivered to voters and constituents with cultural resonance. This is a familiar concept among Americans of color, including the 33.8 million people identified as being more than one race, according to the last U.S. Census.

Code-switching is hardly new and it isn’t a skill entirely foreign to white people. But it remains one of the most effective communication tools that politicians of color use to wield influence and gain power in venues where they have historically not had it.

Code-switching can help increase the likelihood of receiving fair treatment, getting quality service or landing job opportunities for people who are disadvantaged or overlooked due to systemic racism.

After Trump questioned Harris’s race, in response to a question about his own diversity, equity and inclusion rhetoric, interviewer Rachel Scott of ABC News countered by citing elements of the vice president’s biography that might prove she is Black.

Scott noted that Harris attended Howard University, one of the nation’s most prominent historically Black colleges and universities. At Howard, Harris pledged the historically Black sorority Alpha Kappa Alpha. And, most pointedly, her Jamaican father and Indian mother both immigrated to the U.S. during the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s.

It is also false to claim that Harris has only embraced being Black or Indian, or code-switched between the two, when it benefited her politically.

In 2003, the year Harris was elected San Francisco district attorney, she told a local newspaper chain that many people were not used to her identity. “My Indian heritage is just as strong as my African American heritage. One does not exclude the other,” Harris said.

As a candidate for California attorney general, she spoke of her late mother, Shyamala Gopalan, teaching her and her sister to “share in the pride of our culture.” In 2009, Harris told the outlet India Abroad, “When we think about it, India is the oldest democracy in the world — so that is part of my background, and without question has had a great deal of influence on what I do today and who I am.”

During the 2012 reelection campaign of Barack Obama, the nation’s first Black president, Harris related to being the underdog in races where her opponent could outspend her on commercial and ads. “I beat the odds to become the first Black attorney general,” she said, referring to her 2010 election in California.

Trump’s challenging of Harris’ identify, which drew groans and laughter, had echoes of him as the chief propagator of a false theory that Obama was ineligible to be president because was not born in the U.S.. Trump’s Republican running mate, Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, on Wednesday aligned with Trump when he suggested Harris is a “phony who caters to whatever audience is in front of her.”

“I don’t know if you saw this, but earlier this week … she went down to Georgia and started talking with a fake southern accent,” Vance told an audience at a rally in Glendale, Arizona, referencing Harris’s Atlanta campaign event that featured a predominantly Black audience.

Vance, a white man whose wife is Indian American and whose three children are of mixed heritage, is far from the first American politician to fixate on the speech and accents of politicians of color. In 2010, the late Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid came under under fire for comments he made years earlier suggesting Obama’s appealed to voters because he was a fair-skinned Black man “with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one.”

White politicians, too, have been known to code-switch when they are in front of largely Black or Latino audiences. And many have done so to varying degrees of success. In 2006, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was criticized for adapting her speech cadence while delivering remarks at Coretta Scott King’s funeral at Atlanta’s historic Ebenezer Baptist Church, where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. once preached.

The difference is that in the not so distant past, career survival for white politicians did not hinge on their ability to code-switch. Harris continues to have a different lived experience.

Chen said politicians of any races and identities can develop healthy relationships across all communities if they show compassion and are responsive to their constituents’ needs.

“Whether you are white or Black or any other identity, how you show up in the community will determine whether or not it’s an authentic relationship,” she said. “You’re going to be able to address their concerns more effectively because you’re actually more educated and understand what they’re going through.”

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Fox News host Laura Ingraham has launched a new line of attack on the presumptive Democratic nominee, Kamala Harris, hitting her for hugging.

On her Friday evening show, "The Ingraham Angle," the host overlays a news article titled, "Kamala Harris ripped as 'perpetually unprepared' after presser in Munich."

"Now you get it," jabs Ingraham. "It's better for her to stay in her sweet spot — as the hugger-in-chief."

Ingraham then launches a montage of Harris hugging various politicians, including former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

ALSO READ:'That's a lie': The 10 quotes Trump said to Black journalists that led to outbursts

The internet collectively groaned at the attack, including Christopher Wiggins, senior national reporter at the LGBTQ magazine The Advocate, who wrote on X: "Continuing to be weird."

"Will Republicans pre-impeach Kamala Harris for hugging?" he quipped.

Others joined in on the retort.

"First it was laughing now it's hugging? What next if Kamala waving her hand to someone," chided @ViHero340.

"Oh god! No! Not hugging," wrote @AuntSassyA--. "they can't stand that Kamala Harris is a happy person."

The latest comment comes days after Ingraham mocked Harris' age.

"She’s historic. She’s young,” Ingraham said in a mocking tone imitating Democratic supporters of the vice president. “By the way she’s going to be 60 on election day.”

Watch the clip below or at this link.

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MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris has decided on Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate in her bid for the White House, according to people familiar with the choice. The 60-year-old Democrat and military veteran rose to the forefront with a series of plain-spoken television appearances in the days after President Joe Biden decided not to seek a second term. He has made his state a bastion of liberal policy and, this year, one of the few states to protect fans buying tickets online for Taylor Swift concerts and other live events.

Her choice of Walz was confirmed by three people familiar with the decision who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because it had not been made public.

Some things to know about Walz:

Walz comes from rural America
It would be hard to find a more vivid representative of the American heartland than Walz. Born in West Point, Nebraska, a community of about 3,500 people northwest of Omaha, Walz joined the Army National Guard and became a teacher in Nebraska.

He and his wife moved to Mankato in southern Minnesota in the 1990s. That’s where he taught social studies and coached football at Mankato West High School, including for the 1999 team that won the first of the school’s four state championships. He still points to his union membership there.

Walz served 24 years in the Army National Guard before retiring from a field artillery battalion in 2005 as a command sergeant major, one of the military’s highest enlisted ranks.

He has a proven ability to connect with conservative voters
In his first race for Congress, Walz upset a Republican incumbent. That was in 2006, when he won in a largely rural, southern Minnesota congressional district against six-term Rep. Gil Gutknecht. Walz capitalized on voter anger with then-President George W. Bush and the Iraq war.

During six terms in the U.S. House, Walz championed veterans’ issues.

He’s also shown a down-to-earth side, partly through social media video posts with his daughter, Hope. One last fall showed them trying a Minnesota State Fair ride, “The Slingshot,” after they bantered about fair food and her being a vegetarian.



He could help the ticket in key Midwestern states
While Walz isn’t from one of the crucial “blue wall” states of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania, where both sides believe they need to win, he’s right next door. He also could ensure that Minnesota stays in the hands of Democrats.

That’s important because former President Donald Trump has portrayed Minnesota as being in play this year, even though the state hasn’t elected a Republican to statewide office since 2006. A GOP presidential candidate hasn’t carried the state since President Richard Nixon’s landslide in 1972, but Trump has already campaigned there.

When Democratic Gov. Mark Dayton decided not to seek a third term in 2018, Walz campaigned and won the office on a “One Minnesota” theme.

Walz also speaks comfortably about issues that matter to voters in the Rust Belt. He’s been a champion of Democratic causes, including union organizing, workers’ rights and a $15-an-hour minimum wage.

He has experience with divided government
In his first term as governor, Walz faced a Legislature split between a Democratic-led House and a Republican-controlled Senate that resisted his proposals to use higher taxes to boost money for schools, health care and roads. But he and lawmakers brokered compromises that made the state’s divided government still seem productive.

Bipartisan cooperation became tougher during his second year as he used the governor’s emergency power during the COVID-19 pandemic to shutter businesses and close schools. Republicans pushed back and forced out some agency heads. Republicans also remain critical of Walz over what they see as his slow response to sometimes violent unrest that followed the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer in 2020.

Things got easier for Walz in his second term, after he defeated Republican Scott Jensen, a physician known nationally as a vaccine skeptic. Democrats gained control of both legislative chambers, clearing the way for a more liberal course in state government, aided by a huge budget surplus.

Walz and lawmakers eliminated nearly all of the state abortion restrictions enacted in the past by Republicans, protected gender-affirming care for transgender youth and legalized the recreational use of marijuana.

Rejecting Republican pleas that the state budget surplus be used to cut taxes, Democrats funded free school meals for children, free tuition at public colleges for students in families earning under $80,000 a year, a paid family and medical leave program and health insurance coverage regardless of a person’s immigration status.



He has an ear for sound-bite politics
Walz called Republican nominee Donald Trump and running mate JD Vance “just weird” in an MSNBC interview last month and the Democratic Governors Association — which Walz chairs — amplified the point n a post on X. Walz later reiterated the characterization on CNN, citing Trump’s repeated mentions of the fictional serial killer Hannibal Lecter from the film “Silence of the Lambs” in stump speeches.

The word quickly morphed into a theme for Harris and other Democrats, and has a chance to be a watchword of the undoubtably weird 2024 election.

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hanimmal said:

https://apnews.com/article/election-2024-harris-vice-president-walz-minnesota-006bca6e18be7ce39ef4bfd97547c3b5
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Offmymeds said:

He is a likable guy and he made the "weird" meme work. Weird seems to work a lot better than deplorable, hypocritical, or crazy. People seem to actually be stepping back and saying WTF is wrong with the GOP?

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