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WASHINGTON, United States – US Vice President Kamala Harris made her first public appearance on Monday, July 22, as she joins the presidential race after 81-year-old President Joe Biden. suddenly gave up his re-election bid and endorsed her as his successor.
“The legacy that Joe Biden has left over the last three years is unmatched in modern history,” Harris said before speaking at a White House event honoring college athletes.
Harris moved quickly to lock up the Democratic presidential nomination after Biden announced his resignation on Sunday under pressure from fellow Democrats.
Nearly all of the prominent Democrats seen as potential challengers to Harris have endorsed her, including Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear.
Campaign officials and allies have made hundreds of calls on her behalf, urging delegates to next month’s Democratic National Convention to join the push to nominate her for the Nov. 5 presidential election and oppose Republican Donald Trump.
Biden’s departure is the latest shock in the White House race, which has included Former President Trump narrowly escaped assassination Shot by gunmen during the campaign, and the nomination of a fellow Trump hardliner, U.S. Senator J.D. Vanceas his running mate.
“My goal is to win and preserve the nomination. I will do everything in my power to unite the Democratic Party — to unite our country — and to defeat Donald Trump,” Harris said in a statement Sunday.
Harris, who is Black and Asian American, will form an entirely new relationship with the 78-year-old Trump, offering a stark generational and cultural contrast.
The Trump campaign, which has been preparing for weeks for her possible rise, launched a detailed critique of her record on immigration and other issues on Monday, accusing her of being more liberal than Biden, sources told Reuters.
The Trump campaign accused Harris of advocating for abolishing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, decriminalizing border crossings, supporting the so-called Green New Deal, backing a government electric vehicle mandate and encouraging efforts to “defund the police.”
Some of those positions are ones Harris took as an unsuccessful presidential candidate in the 2020 election, when she ran on a more liberal platform than Biden, but they are not taken by the administration, particularly on border security and law enforcement issues.
Biden, the oldest president ever to enter the White House, said he would serve as president until the end of his term on January 20, 2025, and supported Harris to run to succeed him.
Biden’s June 27 performance was shaky debate The performance with Trump led the president’s fellow Democrats to urge him to end his campaign, but senior Republicans called for his resignation, arguing that if he was unfit to run, he was unfit to govern.
Harris spoke on the phone Sunday while wearing a Howard University sweatshirt and eating pizza with anchovies, according to sources, speaking with Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, potential vice presidential running mate, House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Congressional Black Caucus Chairman Rep. Steven Horsford.
Biden’s withdrawal leaves less than four months to run for office.
Trump’s false claim that his 2020 loss to Biden was due to fraud has inspired January 6, 2021, attack On Monday, a lawmaker at the U.S. Capitol questioned the Democrats’ right to change their nominee.
“After Biden won the primary, they took it away from him,” Trump said on his “Truth Social” website.
Despite the early Democratic support for Harris, talk of holding a public convention in Chicago from Aug. 19-22 has not completely died down.
Neither former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi nor former President Barack Obama have announced their support for Biden, although both have praised him.
As the Democratic Party enters uncharted territory, Democratic National Committee Chairman Jaime Harrison said the party will soon announce the next steps in the nominating process.
abortion rights leader
Biden won the Republican presidential nomination in 2020, selected Harris, a former California attorney general and U.S. senator, as his vice president and ultimately defeated Trump.
Harris is expected to largely follow Biden’s foreign policy on issues such as China, Iran and Ukraine, but if she finishes at the top of the Democratic field and wins the November election, she may take a tougher approach to Israel on the Gaza war.
She has been outspoken about abortion rights, an issue that resonates with young voters and liberal Democrats.
Supporters believe she will energize voters, solidify black support and use sharp debating skills to prosecute the political case against the former president.
But some Democrats have concerns about Harris’ candidacy, in part because of the deep legacy of racial and gender discrimination in the United States, which has never elected a female president in its nearly 250-year history.
Polls show Harris performing no better statistically than Biden did against Trump.
In a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted immediately after Trump’s assassination attempt on July 13, Harris and Trump were tied at 44%.
In the same poll, Trump leads Biden 43% to 41%, but the 2-point gap is not significant given the poll’s 3-point margin of error.
The Biden campaign had $95 million on hand as of the end of June, according to filings with the Federal Election Commission. The Trump campaign had $128 million on hand as of that month. Experts in campaign finance law are divided over whether that money could be easily transferred to a Harris-led campaign.
In less than 24 hours after Biden dropped out, the Harris campaign raised $49.6 million, a campaign spokesman said Monday.
More than 44,000 Black women and their allies participated in a three-hour conference call on Sunday evening in support of Harris’ candidacy, including Reps. Maxine Waters, Jasmine Crockett and Joyce Beatty, organizers told Reuters.
Biden has not made a public appearance since testing positive for the coronavirus on Wednesday. He is currently isolating at his home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, and is tentatively scheduled to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday, if he recovers. – Rappler.com
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