7 Takeaways from Harris’ Big “Closing Argument” Campaign Speech

WASHINGTON (AP) — Kamala Harris on Tuesday tried to remind Americans what life was like under Donald Trump and then offered voters a different path forward if they send her to the White House, in a speech billed as her campaign’s closing argument.

“I will always listen to you, even if you don’t vote for me,” she said, speaking to a huge crowd that surged from the grassy ellipse near the White House to the Washington Monument.

LOOK: Harris says Trump’s efforts to sow division and fear ‘not who we are’

Here are some key points from her half-hour speech.

The venue reinforced her message.

Harris deliberately chose to speak from the Ellipse. This is the same location in Washington where Republican Donald Trump helped incite the mob that attacked the US Capitol on January 6, 2021. But the vice president didn’t devote much of her speech to the violence of that day, instead using the field between Constitution Avenue and the White House to serve more as a backdrop — a quiet reminder of the different choices Americans face.

“Donald Trump has spent a decade trying to keep the American people divided and afraid of each other,” she said, adding that he wants to return to the White House “to focus on his problems, not his.”

Kamala Harris, prosecutor, argued her case

Harris worked as a prosecutor for many years. Before becoming a U.S. senator, she was California’s attorney general. And on the campaign trail, she often says she’s only ever had one client: people. In her speech, she described her past work fighting crooks, violent criminals who abused women and children, and cartels that trafficked weapons and people.

She said she would bring a protective instinct with her to the White House.

“There’s something about people being treated unfairly or ignored that gets to me,” she said.

It’s me, hi. I’m a presidential candidate. It’s me.

A week before the election, Harris admitted: “I know many of you are still finding out who I am.”

The Democratic nominee has been running for just three months in a condensed campaign launched after President Joe Biden dropped out of the race. Harris remains up against voters who say they want to know more about her and how she will lead the country. So she spent some time Tuesday talking about her career, goals and background.

“I’ll be honest with you: I’m not perfect. I make mistakes. But this is what I promise you: I will always listen to you, even if you don’t vote for me.”

To-do list for your first day at the White House

Harris spent much of her speech talking about policies she would enact if she won the White House, including helping first-time homeowners with down payments and helping the so-called “sandwich generation” of adults who care for young children and older parents by allowing Medicare finance care for the elderly. She said she would work to pass a bipartisan border security bill that failed last year after Trump urged congressional Republicans to let it die.

And she said she would work to restore abortion protections. “I will fight to restore what Donald Trump and the Supreme Court justices he has elected have taken from the women of America,” Harris said. The Supreme Court, with three Trump-nominated justices, struck down federal abortion protections in 2022. Since then, abortion has become one of the most motivating issues for the Democratic base in the 2024 elections.

“On day one, if Donald Trump is elected, he will walk into this office with a list of enemies,” she said. “When I get elected, I’ll come with a to-do list.”

Size matters in the campaign, especially for Trump

The Ellipse is the green space between the White House and the Washington Monument that has long been home to political events and national traditions such as the annual holiday tree lighting. On Tuesday the hall was packed. Crowds poured onto the National Mall back to the Washington Monument, where giant screens and speakers were installed so people could hear and see from afar.

The screams of a noisy crowd could be heard from the entrance to the White House. Harris’ campaign said it was her largest rally to date. She has already filled stadiums and other venues with supporters during her rallies. Harris likes to needle Trump about the size of the crowd – something that particularly bothers the Republican leader, who claimed the campaign had to bus people in to fill the space on Tuesday.

Harris called Trump “frustrated” and “unstable.” Now she adds “petty tyrant.”

Harris boiled down his criticism of Trump to two words: “petty tyrant.”

She warned that Trump is a grievance-driven man who will focus on himself and his “enemies list” once he gets into the White House. She recalled the founding of the nation, when Americans fought for freedom, and then went through decades of hard-fought battles for civil rights.

“They fought, sacrificed and gave their lives not only to see us surrender our fundamental freedoms. They didn’t do this just to see us submit to the will of yet another petty tyrant,” she said. “These United States of America, we are not a vessel for the plans of wannabe dictators.”

Meanwhile, there is a problem with Biden.

Minutes before Harris’ speech, Biden was on a campaign call reacting to a comedian who called Puerto Rico trash during a Trump rally over the weekend. The president said, “The only trash I see out there are his supporters.”

He joined a national call organized by the advocacy group Voto Latino. Biden urged those in attendance to “vote to keep Donald Trump out of the White House,” adding, “He poses a real danger not just to Latinos, but to all people.”

Biden’s remarks were quickly seized upon by Republicans who said he was denigrating Trump supporters, a distraction for Harris as she tries to reach GOP voters.

Biden quickly sent out a message on social media trying to clarify his remarks.

“His demonization of Latinos is unconscionable,” Biden said of Trump. – That’s all I wanted to say.

After what Harris called her “closing argument,” there is still much to be done.

The event was intended as the finale of the election campaign, designed to clearly indicate the choice of voters next week. But this is far from Harris’ last campaign event. In her final pitch to voters, she will cover all key battleground states.

She will headline events in Wisconsin, North Carolina and Pennsylvania on Wednesday and hold rallies in Arizona and Nevada on Thursday. New events are expected before Election Day.

The campaign is seeking to attract voters from a wide range of demographic groups in hopes that a swing vote here and there could lead to victory in the tight race with Trump.