Vice President Kamala Harris on Thursday formally accepted the Democratic presidential nomination, vowing to unite the nation and convey a sensible perspective to the presidency if she is elected in November.
“I do know there are folks of assorted political opinions watching tonight,” Harris stated in her keynote handle on the ultimate night time of the Democratic Nationwide Conference in Chicago.
“And I would like you to know: I promise to be a president for all People,” she stated.
“I might be a president who unites us round our highest aspirations,” Harris stated. “A president who leads — and listens. Who’s practical. Sensible. And has widespread sense. And all the time fights for the American folks.”
Harris additionally promised that constructing the center class “might be a defining aim of my presidency.”
“That is private for me. The center class is the place I come from,” she stated.
That line channeled the rhetoric of President Joe Biden, who made historical past in late July when he withdrew his reelection bid and endorsed Harris as his alternative.
However Harris’ speech additionally gave her a possibility to uncouple herself from the 81-year-old incumbent — who has been dogged by low approval rankings — and pitch a “new approach ahead.”
“With this election, our nation has a treasured, fleeting alternative to maneuver previous the bitterness, cynicism and divisive battles of the previous,” she stated. “Not as members of any one occasion or faction, however as People.”
The speech capped the DNC’s four-day parade of politicians, celebrities, activists, entertainers and on a regular basis People, starting from Oprah Winfrey and Invoice Clinton to the wrongfully imprisoned members of the Central Park 5.
It additionally mirrored the patriotic overtures and optimistic vibes that outlined a lot of the conference — a transparent effort to enchantment to extra reasonable voters, and defang Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump‘s makes an attempt to label Harris a far-left “Marxist.”
That tone serves one other goal: Underscoring Democrats’ latest chorus that each the previous president Trump and his operating mate, Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, are “bizarre” and do not symbolize many of the nation.
“In some ways, Donald Trump is an unserious man,” Harris stated Thursday night time.
“However the penalties of placing Donald Trump again within the White Home are extraordinarily severe.”
She warned that Trump could be empowered if rewarded with a second time period, referencing a latest Supreme Courtroom ruling that granted former presidents “presumptive immunity” from felony prosecution for his or her official acts.
“Simply think about Donald Trump with no guardrails,” she stated, including that he would wield it “to serve the one shopper he has ever had: himself.”
She talked about the Supreme Courtroom once more later within the speech, when she hammered Trump for having “hand-picked” three justices who helped overturn longstanding federal abortion rights.
Harris additionally took an offensive stance on immigration, one of many points the place the Biden-Harris administration has obtained its lowest approval marks.
She blasted Trump for opposing a bipartisan border safety invoice, saying he ordered Republicans to “kill the deal” as a result of he thought it might harm his marketing campaign.
“As president, I’ll carry again the bipartisan border safety invoice that he killed. And I’ll signal it into legislation,” she stated.
She went on to reaffirm her assist for Israel, rebuking Trump, who has claimed Harris “hates” the Jewish state, whereas acknowledging the “devastating” lack of life in Gaza and vowing to maintain working towards a ceasefire.
And, she added, “I cannot cozy as much as tyrants and dictators, like Kim Jong Un, who’re rooting for Trump.”
