Donald Trump and Kamala Harris: battlelines defined
Kamala Harris has labelled Donald Trump a fraud and a liar and pledged to be the candidate for middle-class America in her first campaign speech after effectively securing the Democratic presidential nomination.
Kamala Harris has labelled Donald Trump a fraud and a liar and pledged to be the candidate for middle-class America in her first campaign speech after effectively securing the Democratic presidential nomination.
Setting the markers for what promises to be a brutal, revamped presidential campaign, Ms Harris, 59, cast herself as the generational candidate for the future while portraying the 78-year-old Mr Trump as a relic of the past. Mr Trump responded by saying Ms Harris was “far more radical” than Joe Biden, and claimed she would be “easier” to defeat.
Speaking before thousands of cheering fans in the suburbs of Milwaukee in the key battleground state of Wisconsin, the Vice-President pitched herself as a progressive candidate for families, healthcare, social security and universal freedoms, including democracy and abortion rights.
“Building up the middle class will be a defining goal of my presidency,” she said in a high energy speech that contrasted sharply with those of Mr Biden.
“Let’s also make no mistake this campaign, is not just about us versus Donald Trump, this campaign is about who we fight for. We have a lot of work to do, but we will win.”
Ms Harris praised Mr Biden for bowing out of the presidential race and endorsing her, attacked Mr Trump on his criminal record, and promised to fight for a ban on assault weapons.
Ms Harris, whose campaign has raised more than $US100m ($151m) since Sunday, a record in presidential campaign history, dwelt on what the party believes is a weak point for Mr Trump and the Republicans – abortion, which has become severely restricted in some states following a Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v Wade.
“We who believe in reproductive freedom will stop Donald Trump’s extreme abortion bans because we trust women to make decisions about their own body and not have their government tell them what to do,” she said.
“We believe in a future where every person has the opportunity not just to get by, but to get ahead.”
Her speech came after a tumultuous week in which the President abandoned his bid for re-election and endorsed Ms Harris, triggering an astonishing wave of support among Democrats who have effectively anointed her as their presidential candidate without a contest.
Ms Harris said she now had enough commitments from Mr Biden’s former party delegates to be named as the nominee at next month’s Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
Meanwhile a new poll showed Ms Harris with a two-percentage-point lead over Mr Trump.
The Reuters/Ipsos poll, one of the first head-to-head polls conducted since it became likely that the November election would be a choice between Ms Harris and Mr Trump, showed 44 per cent support for Ms Harris and 42 per cent support for Mr Trump. The same poll put Mr Trump at 43 per cent and Mr Biden at 41 per cent before the latter bowed out.
Ms Harris is expected to receive bounce in the polls in the next few weeks before they settle and give a clearer picture of who leads this new-look race.
Shortly before Ms Harris spoke, the President flew back to Washington from his holiday home in Delaware in his first public appearance after recovering from Covid and abandoning the presidential race.
He will address the nation from the White House at 8pm on Wednesday (10am Thursday AEST) to explain his decision, defend his record and pledge his support for Ms Harris. Two of the most senior Democrats in congress, Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries, enthusiastically backed Ms Harris as the party’s candidate to replace Mr Biden, capping an extraordinary 48 hours in which the Vice-President privately stared down any rivals. “President Biden’s selfless decision has given the party the opportunity to unite behind a new nominee and, boy oh boy, are we enthusiastic,” Senator Schumer said.
Barack Obama, the only senior Democrat not to endorse Ms Harris, reportedly doesn’t want to be seen as attempting to influence party members, or fuel criticism that her nomination was a coronation. Mr Trump said he wanted to debate Ms Harris. “I think it’s important,” he said. “I would be willing to do more than one debate, actually. She’s far more radical than he is … So I think she should be easier than Biden, because he was slightly more mainstream.”
The Trump campaign has signalled that it will attack Ms Harris by tying her to the President’s record on inflation, crime and immigration.
Mr Trump’s campaign has also sought to undermine Ms Harris’s political and financial momentum by lodging a formal complaint with the Federal Election Commission, accusing her campaign of breaching campaign finance regulations and of a ‘brazen cash grab”.
It alleged that Ms Harris improperly took over funds originally designated for Mr Biden’s campaign by renaming Mr Biden’s committee as “Harris for President”.
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