With the farewell to President Joe Biden a night earlier, Democrats wanted to turn the page Tuesday night to focus squarely on the excitement of their new nominee, Kamala Harris. And they celebrated with an unconventional and raucous roll call vote that ended with a reprise of “hope and change” — and a forceful rebuke of Donald Trump from Barack and Michelle Obama.
In an uneventful virtual roll call two weeks earlier, Harris had already secured the presidential nomination after her rapid ascension to the top of the ticket. Tuesday’s ceremonial vote was a foregone conclusion, but Democrats put a different spin on it with a DJ, surprise celebrity guests and what turned into a dance party on the convention floor.
Harris made another surprise appearance — this time from a live-streamed campaign rally in Milwaukee with her running mate Tim Walz that came right after her home state of California wrapped up the roll call vote where she was “reaffirmed” as the nominee.
“They just completed their roll call, and they have nominated Coach Walz and me to be the next vice president and president of the United States. I thank everyone there and here in believing what we can do together. This is a people-powered campaign, and together, we will chart a new way forward,” Harris said.
“To everyone in Chicago and across America, thank you. I’ll see you in two days, Chicago,” she concluded. Harris will accept the nomination on Thursday night.
The headlining speeches brought back the familiar refrains and campaign mottos borne out of Obama’s 2008 election. The former president started his speech by noting he was “feeling fired up and ready to go.”
“America, hope is making a comeback,” Michelle Obama said, adding that she had “mourned the dimming of hope” and the “powerful sense of dread about the future.”
But the closing speeches from the former president and first lady demonstrated the dual challenges on Tuesday night of showcasing Harris’ candidacy and career while also drawing a contrast with the former president.
They described Trump as a person and candidate who puts his own interests before those of Americans.
“It’s one of the oldest tricks in politics — from a guy whose act has gotten pretty stale,” Barack Obama said. “We don’t need four more years of bluster and chaos. We’ve seen that movie — and we all know that the sequel’s usually worse.”
Michelle Obama argued that she and most Americans would not benefit “from the affirmative action of generational wealth.” And she recalled the personal attacks levied against her husband and family when he was a candidate for office.
“For years, Donald Trump did everything in his power to try to make people fear us,” the former first lady said in a subtle reference to the birther conspiracies from Trump, who questioned Obama’s citizenship when he first ran for president.
“His limited and narrow view of the world made him feel threatened by the existence of two hard-working, highly educated, successful people who also happened to be Black. Who’s going to tell him that the job he’s currently seeking might just be one of those ‘Black jobs?'” she said, lips pursed, as the hall erupted in applause.
But while they landed some of the harshest attacks of the night against Trump, Barack Obama later pivoted from his jabs to a more unifying message for a country divided by politics.
“The vast majority of us don’t want to live in a country that’s bitter and divided. We want something better. We want to be better, and the joy and excitement we’re seeing around this campaign tells us we’re not alone,” he said.
Second gentleman Douglas Emhoff painted the more personal side of Harris: their marriage and her role as stepmother to his two children. He recalled how he was set up with Harris on a blind date and how he first wooed her by leaving her a rambling voicemail at 8:30 a.m. — one she saved and insists on playing on every anniversary.
Emhoff would make history as the first first gentleman if Democrats win in November.
“She stands up to bullies, just like my parents taught me to,” Emhoff said. “She likes to see people do well and hates when they’re treated unfairly. She believes this work requires a basic curiosity in how people are doing. Her empathy is her strength.”
Political observers have compared the newfound excitement of the party to when Obama first entered onto the national scene, later becoming the country’s first Black president.
Connecticut delegates’ reactions
Delegates from Connecticut see parallels to the 2008 election, but they argue it is a new kind of energy in the aftermath of the pandemic as well as in a post-Trump world.
“I actually think the energy is even greater because you came from this kind of a malaise to this exuberance,” John Olsen, Connecticut’s member on the Democratic National Committee.
“It’s different from Obama, because we’ve been in slump since 2020,” said Joyce Petteway, a delegate from Waterbury and president of the CT Federation of Democratic Women.
“We’re coming back, and that’s why it was so exciting,” Petteway said. “This feels like the old Democrats.”
John McNamara, another Connecticut delegate who serves as majority leader on New Britain’s city council, said he sees a “direct line” between the Rev. Jesse Jackson’s rainbow coalition speech at the 1984 convention to Obama’s success and now Harris’ historic nomination as the first woman of color to become a major party presidential nominee.
In that speech, Jackson, who ran for the Democratic presidential nomination that year as well as in 1988, compared America to a quilt with “many patches, many pieces, many colors, many sizes, all woven and held together by a common thread.”
Right as McNamara recalled the significance of that speech while sitting in the convention hall on Monday night, Jackson made a perfectly timed appearance. Jackson, who has been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, came onto the stage in a wheelchair to enjoy a tribute to his political career.
“After the Civil Rights laws, there’s a progression, and we’ll see if the county’s ready for Kamala Harris, a woman and person of color this time,” McNamara said. “I think the anti-woman vote in the country may be less than eight years ago.”
That energy was on full display during the ceremonial roll call with a DJ pumping up the crowd as states went one-by-one through the votes that were virtually cast weeks earlier, with a different soundtrack for each state.
Gov. Ned Lamont and U.S. Rep. Jahana Hayes, D-5th District, shared Connecticut’s moment as the DJ blared the Stevie Wonder’s song “Signed, Sealed, Delivered (I’m Yours).”
“Connecticut is the constitution state, home of the submarine, home of the jet engine, home of the UConn Huskies — slam dunk — home of Keith Richards, lead guitar!” Lamont said before handing the mic to Hayes.
“Tonight we cast 73 votes and one present for the first female president of the United States of America, Kamala Harris,” Hayes said.
Essam Boraey, a delegate from West Hartford, was the present vote, which was cast virtually weeks earlier. When asked why he voted present, he refused to explain.
Nancy DiNardo, chairwoman of the Connecticut Democratic Party, said she did not know the rationale.
A few other states, including Texas, Washington and Minnesota, also delivered a handful of present votes. The virtual votes were cast a week prior to Harris selecting Walz, the governor of Minnesota, as her running mate.
The party’s divisions over the Israel-Gaza war have loomed over the Democrats’ convention, and there have been minimal, if any, disruptions inside the United Center for the first half of the week. But thousands of demonstrators have been protesting for the past few days, with the biggest protest happening ahead of Monday night’s programming.
The war has received a few mentions from the convention stage, with Democrats walking a careful line on the issue.
Noting that his administration is still working on a ceasefire and hostage release deal, Biden gave a quick nod to the pro-Palestinian protesters who have been demonstrating around the country and outside of the convention perimeter in Chicago. In his Monday night speech, Biden said that the thousands of protesters “out in the streets have a point — a lot of innocent people are dying on both sides.”
“We’ll keep working to bring hostages home and end the war in Gaza, and bring peace and security to the Middle East,” Biden said.
U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., echoed a similar point during his primetime speech on Tuesday.
“We must end this war in Gaza, bring home the hostages and demand an immediate ceasefire,” he said to applause.
The run-up to the roll call vote and the closing speech by Obama included the grandsons of two presidents, John F. Kennedy and Jimmy Carter, and a former Trump press secretary.
Carter is 99 and in hospice care, but his grandson, Jason Carter, said, “My grandfather can’t wait to vote for Kamala Harris.”
Jack Schlossberg, whose mother is Caroline Kennedy, the daughter of John F. Kennedy, invoked “the passing of the torch,” the line that applied to his grandfather as the first president born in the 20th century.
Contrasts with Trump
The Obamas were not the only speakers on Tuesday night to draw a contrast with Trump. Democrats lined up a few speeches from Republicans who are not supporting their own ticket as well as those who were once deeply involved in the former president’s orbit.
Trump’s former fixer, Michael Cohen, was walking around the convention floor prior to the roll call vote. He has been speaking to the press about the threats Trump poses to democracy. But Cohen, who was convicted for campaign finance violations and tax and bank fraud, did not have a speaking slot on Tuesday night.
Stephanie Grisham, who was press secretary to Trump and Melania Trump, had the highest profile of the disgruntled Trump supporters to find a welcome in Chicago.
She repeated her oft-told story of becoming the first senior aide to resign on Jan. 6, 2021, after the first lady refused to urge her husband to wave off the supporters who had rioted at the U.S. Capitol, attacking police and trying to stop the certification of Biden’s election.
“I love my country more than my party,” she said. “Kamala Harris tells the truth. She respects the American people, and she has my vote.”
“I never thought I’d be speaking at a Democratic convention,” she added. “But after seeing firsthand who Donald Trump really is, and the threat he poses to our country, I feel very strongly about speaking out.”
For all the energy in the room and around Harris’ candidacy, the speakers insisted that Democrats cannot become complacent in what is expected to be another close election with a divided electorate.
“For all the incredible energy we’ve been able to generate over the last few weeks, this will still be a tight race in a closely divided country,” Obama said — “a country where too many Americans are still struggling and don’t believe the government can help.”
This story was originally published by the Connecticut Mirror Aug. 21, 2024.
