Closing summary
We’re now closing this blog – but join us for all the latest speeches, news and reaction from the second day of the Democratic national convention in our dedicated blog:
Thanks for following along so far. Here is a recap of the key developments of the day so far:
Barack Obama will deliver a “forceful affirmation that [Kamala] Harris is the right leader for the moment” during his speech on Tuesday night at the Democratic national convention, an adviser to the former president told CNN. A source familiar with Obama’s prepared speech told the Washington Post that he will “affirm why Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are precisely the leaders the country needs right now, lay out the task in front of Democrats over the next eleven weeks, and bring into focus the values at stake in this election and at the heart of our politics.”
Michelle Obama will address the convention shortly before her husband Barack takes the stage. The couple’s endorsement of Harris in July was seminal in securing the Democratic presidential nomination for the current vice-president, helping to bypass a potentially ugly internal fight.
Independent presidential candidate Robert F Kennedy Jr. and his running mate, tech lawyer Nicole Shanahan, are considering dropping out of the race and supporting Donald Trump, Shanahan said. In a interview on the End Tribalism in Politics podcast that aired today, reported by the Washington Post, Shanahan said: “There’s two options that we’re looking at and one is staying in, forming that new party, but we run the risk of a Kamala Harris and Waltz presidency because we draw more votes from Trump. Or we walk away right now and join forces with with Donald Trump and explain to our base why we’re making this decision.”
The US Secret Service was checking into bomb threats made at “various locations” in downtown Chicago where the Democratic national convention is taking place, AP reported. A threat was emailed to the Fox 32 Newsroom which said pipe bombs were placed at four hotels in downtown Chicago, including the Nobu Hotel, the Hotel Chicago West Loop and the Hyatt House Chicago in West Loop and the University District, the outlet reported.
Chicago police said there was a “brief breach” of security fencing “within sight and sound of the United Center” on Monday evening, where the DNC is being held. Some 13 protesters were arrested on charges ranging from criminal trespass and resisting and obstructing an arrest to aggravated battery of police officers. The pro-Palestine demonstrations have brought thousands to the city.
Donald Trump delivered remarks on Tuesday in Howell, Michigan, a city with historical links to the Ku Klux Klan and where white supremacists marched through the streets last month and chanted “We love Hitler. We love Trump.”
Stephanie Grisham, a former White House press secretary under the Trump administration, will speak at the Democratic national convention today to show her support for Kamala Harris.
Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota governor Tim Walz, will attend a campaign rally in Wisconsin today where she is scheduled to deliver remarks at around 8pm Central Time.
Updated
Bernie Sanders, meanwhile, will focus his remarks on the US economy.
“Bottom line: we need an economy that works for all of us, not just the greed of the billionaire class,” Sanders plans to say, in a preview of his speech that his press office shared with journalists.
Here’s more:
These oligarchs tell us we shouldn’t tax the rich; we shouldn’t take on price gouging; we shouldn’t expand Medicare to cover dental, hearing, and vision; and we shouldn’t increase Social Security benefits for struggling seniors.
Well I’ve got some bad news for them.
That is precisely what we are going to do, and we’re going to win this struggle because this is precisely what the American people want from their government.
Kamala Harris has also been discussing plans to propose a federal ban on price gouging on food and groceries and lowering the cost of education and childcare. She is no longer promoting Medicare for All, which she initially had co-sponsored with Sanders, as part of a broader shift toward the center. But she has been promoting strengthening Medicare, and expanding other health programs that area already in place.
Here’s more on her platform:
Updated
Doug Emhoff will share why he sees his wife Kamala Harris as a “joyful warrior” in his speech tonight, according to excerpts of his speech.
“Whenever she’s needed, however she’s needed, Kamala rises to the occasion,” Emhoff plans to say. “She did it for me and our family. Now that the country needs her, she’s showing you what we already know: she’s ready to lead, she brings both joy and toughness to this task, and she will be a great president who we will all be proud of.”
Emhoff has become an important surrogate for Harris on the campaign trail, speaking about reproductive rights, LGBTQ+ rights and antisemitism.
The second gentleman, who is a lawyer and visiting professor at Georgetown University Law Center, has faced a wave of antisemitic, misogynistic attacks since his wife became a presidential candidate. If Harris wins the election, Emhoff would become the first ever first gentleman.
Updated
About 20 million people watched the first night of the convention on TV, according to Nielsen.
The viewership surpassed that of the first day of the Republican convention, when about 18.13 million people tuned in to watch.
The media statistics organization accounted for viewership of convention coverage across 13 networks including ABC, CBS, NBC, Scripps News, Univision, CNN, CNNe, Fox Business, Fox News Channel, MSNBC, Newsmax, NewsNation and PBS.
Updated
Away from the Democratic convention, RFK Jr is considering ending his campaign for president to help Donald Trump, according to his running mate.
The startling disclosure was made by Nicole Shanahan, Kennedy’s vice-presidential candidate, who said the pair was considering dropping their campaign over fears it might help elect Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee, as president.
Shanahan’s remarks, made on the Impact Theory With Tim Bilyeau podcast, were close to an all-out admission that Kennedy’s campaign had more in common with Trump’s than Harris’s. Kennedy was a member of the Democratic party and attempted to run as its nominee before choosing to stand as an independent.
Read the full story here:
Updated
Valerie Jarrett, a former senior adviser to Barack Obama, has warned that Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, currently riding high in the polls, faces plenty of ups and downs before November.
“You all remember when President Obama won the Iowa caucuses – if you are old enough to remember that,” Jarrett, speaking at Axios House in Chicago, said of Obama’s first primary campaign against Hillary Clinton in 2008. “We got: ‘Oh, my goodness!’ and ‘We are going for gold!’”
Then came the New Hampshire primary and a “devastating defeat”, she added. “But out of that, people found out who he was. We came out of that terrible experience. It forced us to have to go to many more states and introduce him to many more people and, in the end, it was actually good for us.”
Harris is bound to undergo “a whole multitude of tests”, Jarrett said. “She is absolutely on a roll right now. I think it’s a hands-up enthusiasm. People are just tired of all the negativity, the polarisation, the toxicity. I think what Governor Walz said: she’s full of joy. People want joy. They actually want to like each other.”
Harris, who has replaced Joe Biden at the top of the Democratic ticket, has embarked on a much shorter campaign than the one Obama fought. Jarrett expressed confidence in Harris and running mate Tim Walz and their advisers to deal with obstacles and keep pushing forward.
Updated
Hot from his primetime appearance at the Democratic convention on Monday night, Shawn Fain, the president of the United Auto Workers (UAW), has been explaining to reporters why he wore a T-shirt imprinted with the phrase “Trump is a scab.”
“I’ve been a union member for UAW for 30 years, and we have a term for people that cross picket lines and don’t respect working-class people. We call them scabs, and that’s what Donald Trump is.”
Fain said that the political leanings of the UAW’s more than 1 million active and retired members had remained stable over the years at about 65% Democratic and 30-32% Republican. But he predicted that this time around, the gap would widen as union members gravitate towards Kamala Harris.
“She’s an amazing, very strong woman. I think people underestimate her, and that’s a huge mistake. I think she’s going to move a massive mountain come November,” he said.
The UAW is preparing to launch in the next week or so what has been billed as the biggest field campaign in its history to persuade its members to turn out to vote.
Fain said that in his view, people would lean towards the Democratic ticket because when they look at Harris and her running mate Tim Walz, “they see themselves. I mean, no one looks at Donald Trump and says: ‘I identify with that person.’”
Updated
Barack and Michelle Obama, Bernie Sanders, Doug Emhoff among main speakers on Democratic convention's second night
The Democratic national convention just released the full schedule of its second night, confirming that Barack Obama will deliver the evening’s keynote speech, and Michelle Obama, second gentleman Doug Emhoff and independent senator Bernie Sanders are also scheduled to make remarks.
The grandsons of John F Kennedy and Jimmy Carter will be among the early speakers at the convention, along with Stephanie Grisham, Donald Trump’s former White House press secretary.
As the night goes on, we’ll hear from Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer, and then Sanders, both of whom will speak at the 8pm CT hour. Emhoff and Michelle Obama will speak after 9pm, and Barack Obama is to address delegates starting at 10pm.
Do not be surprised if the schedule runs late, as it did last night.
Updated
Lurking in the United Center’s rafters are thousands of balloons that are primed to drop:
— Chris Stein (@ChrisJStein) August 20, 2024
Political conventions, both Democratic and Republican, typically end with a cascade of balloons. Expect to see that on Thursday night, after Kamala Harris ends her keynote address.
Arizona senator Mark Kelly and transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg spoke at the Veterans and Military Families Council at the Democratic national convention today, arguing that concepts of patriotism and freedom are not the monopoly of the Republican party.
“Folks come from all over our country, with all kinds of backgrounds to serve,” Kelly said. “We’ve all served alongside folks of different political stripes, and some who are not political at all … Some Republicans want to think that their political party has a monopoly on patriotism. No party does. But it’s clear which political candidate supports military veterans, and which one does not.”
Sen. Mark Kelly, Sec. Pete Buttigieg, at the DNC. pic.twitter.com/A6qarGqQsu
— George Chidi (@neonflag) August 20, 2024
Kelly took Trump to task for his recent comments suggesting that the Presidential Medal of Freedom was a “better” award than the Medal of Honor because “everyone [who] gets the Congressional Medal of Honor, they’re soldiers. They’re either in very bad shape because they’ve been hit so many times by bullets, or they’re dead.”
“The VFW, of which I am a member, called these comments asinine,” said Kelly, a former astronaut and Gulf war veteran. “I agree.”
Both Kelly and Buttigieg made oblique references to the attacks made by Republicans on the record of Democratic vice-presidential candidate Tim Walz.
“You can count from the despicable way – the weird way - that he talks about the service,” Buttigieg said, “There’s a through-line that goes all the way back to the days when Donald Trump used his status as a teenage multimillionaire to procure a doctor’s note to pretend that he was unable to serve, so that some working-class man from who knows, maybe the south side of Chicago went to Vietnam in his place. There’s an unbroken pattern right there of not being able to grasp service to others. Veterans understand service to others. Today’s Democrats understand service to others.”
Gwen Walz, wife of the Democratic VP pick, spoke with pride of their service as teachers, and his service as a national guardsman. “I will put that service up against anyone’s,” Walz said. “We are building a future for all of us, each and every one of us that we can be proud of.”
Updated
It’s sound check time inside the United Center, where the Democratic national convention is being held, and the few journalists and guests in the venue early are getting a sneak peak of who’s performing tonight.
Rapper Common is onstage now, spitting verse that pays tribute to Kamala Harris.
“Let’s go, ya’ll! Chitown! DNC!” he said, to a smattering of applause. There aren’t that many people here, but he will probably get a much louder reception in a few hours.
Updated
We reported earlier that the US Secret Service was looking into bomb threats made on Tuesday at “various locations” in Chicago where the Democratic national convention is taking place.
According to a police scanner, 14 bomb threats were made today, mostly at hotels in downtown Chicago.
A listing of all reported bomb threats at #DNCChicago today#ChicagoScanner pic.twitter.com/iuGgBzmnB2
— 16th & 17th District Chicago Police Scanner (@CPD1617Scanner) August 20, 2024
I’ve been over at the McCormick Place convention center all day again, popping in and out of caucus and council meetings. And I finally had a chance to check out Dempalooza, an expo event with a bunch of vendors – some selling Democratic and Harris merch, some selling local goods, some selling politics.
I saw at least five Kamala Harris cardboard cutouts and a “coconut room”, a nod to Harris’ iconic “you think you just fell out of a coconut tree” line that social media loves.
One of those cutouts had Harris in a superhero outfit, and people came up to take photos alongside it. There is also a display of presidential footwear, with displays cases of old shoes.
Checked out the DNC expo area, called “Dem-palooza,” which wasn’t super active but had a ton of vendor booths with Dem/Harris merch & local goods along some voter orgs and a “coconut room” and at least five Harris cardboard cutouts pic.twitter.com/5Vv9OyBPRS
— Rachel Leingang (@rachelleingang) August 20, 2024
The area wasn’t very busy – the Democratic convention is spread across McCormick Place and the United Center, and getting from one to the other was a major challenge for some delegates yesterday, so as the day wears on, the McCormick location is getting quiet as folks start to make their way to the United Center for tonight’s speakers.
Updated
Singer-songwriter James Taylor was scheduled to perform on Monday night on the first night of the Democratic national convention in Chicago, but as the evening ran long, organizers skipped elements of the program, meaning that Taylor never took the stage.
DNC officials said in a statement that because of the “raucous applause interrupting speaker after speaker, we ultimately skipped elements of our program to ensure we could get to President Biden as quickly as possible so that he could speak directly to the American people,” per NBC News Chicago.
Taylor himself released a statement this afternoon, saying that it “became clear” as the evening went on that there “wouldn’t be time for our ‘You’ve Got a Friend’” adding that “maybe the organizers couldn’t anticipate the wild response from the floor of the United Center.” “Sorry to disappoint,” he added.
But a great and inspirational, quintessentially American moment. We were honored to be there.
"...But it became clear, as the evening unfolded, that there wouldn’t be time for our “You’ve Got a Friend” with cello and voices. Maybe the organizers couldn’t anticipate the wild response from the floor of the United Center… "#JT #JamesTaylor #DNC #DNC2024 pic.twitter.com/B6LG7yxXaX
— James Taylor (@JamesTaylor_com) August 20, 2024
Donald Trump, in an interview with CBS News that aired last night, said he would accept the election outcome if he believes the election is “free and fair”. He said:
I think if I lose, this country will go into a tailspin, the likes of which it’s never seen before – the likes of 1929 – but if I do, and it’s free and fair, absolutely, I will accept the results.”
“Fair” to Trump “means that votes are counted,” he said, adding:
It means that votes are fair. It means that they don’t cheat on the election, they don’t drop ballots, they don’t install new rules and regulations that they don’t have the power to do.”
He added:
If I see that we had a fair and free election, which I hope to be able to say, but if I see that, I will be – you will never see anybody more honorable than me. I’m an honorable person.”
Updated
How to watch Obama's speech at the Democratic convention
Exactly 20 years ago, Barack Obama was a relatively unknown state legislator when he delivered a keynote address at the Democratic party’s convention. Obama said that evening:
I stand here knowing that my story is part of the larger American story, that I owe a debt to all of those who came before me, and that, in no other country on Earth, is my story even possible.
His 2004 speech offers one of the clearest examples of how convention speeches can elevate a rising political star to national prominence. Four years later, he returned to accept the party’s nomination for president.
In 2012, he made the case for his re-election bid; in 2016, he advocated for Hillary Clinton to succeed him in office; and during the 2020 convention, he issued an attack on Donald Trump and urged Americans to back Joe Biden for president.
Now, his speech will make the case for the Harris-Walz ticket and the need to defeat Trump.
Updated
Donald Trump, in his interview with CBS News, said he would “gladly” release his medical records and insisted that he is not experiencing any post-traumatic stress disorder or other lasting effects following his assassination attempt last month.
Trump said he had recently passed a medical exam with a “perfect score” and that he had “aced” two cognitive tests.
Trump says he has 'no regrets' about overturning Roe v Wade
Donald Trump said he has “no regrets” over how his appointment of three conservative supreme court justices led to the reversal of Roe v Wade and ended the constitutional right to an abortion.
Trump, speaking to CBS News on Monday night, said:
The federal government should have nothing to do with this issue.
Former President Donald Trump says he has "no regrets" over how his appointment of three conservative Supreme Court justices led to the reversal of Roe v. Wade and ended the constitutional right to an abortion.
— CBS News (@CBSNews) August 20, 2024
"The federal government should have nothing to do with this issue,"… pic.twitter.com/zSS8ixCZM2
Updated
Josh Shapiro, the governor of Pennsylvania who was a finalist to be Kamala Harris’s running mate, will be speaking in a prime time slot on Wednesday night, the Washington Post reported, citing a source.
Pennsylvania Democrats are expected to be in the spotlight during the Democratic national convention this week. The state’s lieutenant governor, Austin Davis, addressed the convention on Monday night.
Pennsylvania and its 19 electoral college votes are considered key to both Kamala Harris’s and Donald Trump’s chances of victory in November.
Updated
Anxious Democratic strategists are quietly trying to douse the euphoria engulfing Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign by warning that her surge in popularity masks an election contest that is on a knife-edge and could easily be lost.
As the vice-president basks in adulation and optimism at the Democratic national convention in Chicago, key supporters are cautioning that more trying times lie ahead after an extended honeymoon period following her ascent to the top of the ticket in place of Joe Biden.
Fuelling the Democrats’ feelgood mood have been a spate of opinion polls showing Harris with a national lead over Donald Trump while also leading or newly competitive in battleground states, including southern Sun belt states where Biden had been struggling badly before his withdrawal from the race last month.
A recent compilation of national polls by 538, a polling website, showed Harris leading Trump by 46.6% to 43.8%.
Secret Service looking into bomb threats in downtown Chicago - report
The US Secret Service was checking into bomb threats made at “various locations” in downtown Chicago where the Democratic national convention is taking place, AP reported.
A threat was emailed to the Fox 32 Newsroom which said pipe bombs were placed at four hotels in downtown Chicago, including the Nobu Hotel, the Hotel Chicago West Loop and the Hyatt House Chicago in West Loop and the University District, the outlet reported.
The threat mentioned the Democratic national convention that is taking place this week, it said.
Police and K9’s at the Nobu Hotel in west loop … our news desk received an email claiming a pipe bomb threat at this and three other west loop / near west side hotels pic.twitter.com/SVwKpE7ouP
— Paris Schutz (@paschutz) August 20, 2024
Tim Walz received a huge response from the youth council meeting at the Democratic convention, riling up young people by recalling his time as a high school teacher and a football coach.
Huge response at the DNC youth council as Gov Tim Walz unexpectedly pops in to speak. He credits his students for getting him involved in politics. “Be careful, next thing you know, you’re the next vice presidential nominee.” pic.twitter.com/p3eueTPpsL
— Rachel Leingang (@rachelleingang) August 20, 2024
Once the word “coach” was uttered by the person announcing Walz, the crowd started moving toward the stage and cheering. Walz, the governor of Minnesota, and Kamala Harris’s running mate, credited his former students with getting him involved in politics.
“Be careful: next thing you know, you’re the next vice presidential nominee,” he joked.
He brought up issues key to young voters, like the cost of college, saying that the generation before him invested in his generation, so the cost of college back then “wasn’t so damn expensive.”
And he implored the young people to get out and work hard over the next few months to elect Democrats in this election, telling them they can sleep when they’re dead. As he left the stage, the crowd chanted “Coach! Coach!”
My kids keep me humble. https://t.co/XP9kpIYjgl
— Tim Walz (@Tim_Walz) August 20, 2024
Hillary Clinton has just posted a clip on X from her speech at the DNC last night.
“Kamala Harris will never rest in defense of our freedom and safety. Donald Trump fell asleep at his own trial,” she said, prompting gales of laughter around the convention floor.
Clinton continued: “When he woke up, he made his own kind of history—as the first person to run for president with 34 felony convictions.” This elicited pantomime boos from the crowd.
Kamala Harris will never rest in defense of our freedom and safety. Donald Trump fell asleep at his own trial.
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) August 20, 2024
When he woke up, he made his own kind of history—as the first person to run for president with 34 felony convictions. pic.twitter.com/VTUm5KcKHJ
Interim summary
Hello US politics blog readers, there is an awful lot going on at the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Chicago as well as on the 2024 election campaign trail for both the Democrats and top Republicans. And it’s going to be another huge night on the convention stage, so stick with Guardian US for all the developments as they happen.
Here’s where things stand:
Barack Obama will deliver a forceful affirmation that Kamala Harris is the “right leader for the moment” during his speech on Tuesday night at the DNC, an adviser to the former president told CNN.
Chicago police said there was a “brief breach” of security fencing “within sight and sound of the United Center” on Monday evening, where the DNC is being held. Some 13 protesters were arrested on charges ranging from criminal trespass and resisting and obstructing an arrest to aggravated battery of police officers. The pro-Palestine demonstrations have brought thousands to the city.
Donald Trump will deliver remarks on Tuesday in Howell, Michigan, a city with historical links to the Ku Klux Klan and where white supremacists marched through the streets last month and chanted “We love Hitler. We love Trump.” Trump is scheduled to speak this afternoon about “crime and safety” at Livingston County Sheriff’s County in Howell, a city of about 10,000 residents northwest of Detroit. It will be Trump’s sixth visit to Michigan this year.
Stephanie Grisham, a former White House press secretary under the Trump administration, will speak at the Democratic national convention today to show her support for Kamala Harris. Grisham worked in a number of different roles for Trump – as a press aide during Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, as chief of staff and press secretary for then-first lady, Melania Trump, and as White House press secretary and communications director. She resigned in the aftermath of the 6 January 2021 attack on the US Capitol.
Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota governor Tim Walz, will attend a campaign rally in Wisconsin today where she is scheduled to deliver remarks at around 8pm Central Time.
Doug Emhoff, the second gentleman of the US, is due to address the DNC later today.
Barack and Michelle Obama and Bernie Sanders are all scheduled to make speeches at the DNC today.
Andy Beshear, the Democratic governor of Kentucky, has insisted that he does not “wish harm on anyone” after the Trump-Vance campaign accused him of calling for a member of Ohio senator JD Vance’s family to be raped.
Beshear was speaking on MSNBC this morning when he criticized Republicans for “fear tactics” on abortion messaging, noting Vance’s previous comments about abortion. Beshear said:
JD Vance calls pregnancy resulting from rape inconvenient. Inconvenience is traffic, I mean, it is, uh, make him go through this.
Beshear was referring to a comment Vance made in 2021, while running for Ohio senate, where he said he did not support rape and incest exceptions in abortion bans.
The Trump-Vance campaign quickly jumped on Beshear’s comments today, with Vance asking why the Kentucky governor is “wishing that a member of my family would get raped?!?”
Asked if that had been his intent, Beshear replied: “Of course not” and called Vance’s response an example of the party’s “deflection”, adding:
Obviously, I never wish harm on anyone. It just, again, deflection, trying to make himself and Donald Trump the victims.
It has been suggested that Joe Biden holds Barack Obama partly culpable for his political demise when he stepped down in July. Obama did not encourage the president to end his campaign, but nor did he rally to his side when pressure mounted.
That context will make Obama’s keynote speech on Tuesday all the more poignant. It was already imbued with personal significance for Obama.
It was the soaring keynote speech that Obama made at the Democratic national convention in Boston, Massachusetts exactly 20 years ago – in which he talked of the “audacity of hope” of “a skinny kid with a funny name who believes that America has a place for him, too” – that rocket-launched him from his then relatively lowly status as a state senator in Illinois into the presidency just four years later.
In his speech on Tuesday night, Obama is expected to set out Harris’s qualifications for the world’s most powerful job. Earlier this month he commended her on X, saying:
She has the vision, the character, and the strength that this critical moment demands, and I know she will deliver.
From capping the cost of prescription drugs for all to providing first-time homebuyers with financial support to restoring the child tax credit for families, @KamalaHarris just laid out some ways she'll help lower costs for the American people.
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) August 16, 2024
She has the vision, the… pic.twitter.com/ulLBup9tZU
Obama to deliver 'forceful affirmation' for Harris in speech
Barack Obama will deliver a “forceful affirmation that [Kamala] Harris is the right leader for the moment” during his speech on Tuesday night at the Democratic national convention, an adviser to the former president told CNN.
A source familiar with Obama’s prepared speech told the Washington Post that he will “affirm why Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are precisely the leaders the country needs right now, lay out the task in front of Democrats over the next eleven weeks, and bring into focus the values at stake in this election and at the heart of our politics.”
Carrying the flame on the second night of primetime speeches on Tuesday will be the Obamas, with Michelle Obama addressing the convention shortly before her husband Barack takes the stage.
The couple’s endorsement of Harris in July was seminal in securing the Democratic presidential nomination for the current vice-president, helping to bypass a potentially ugly internal fight.
The Obamas stamped their approval on a Harris bid for the White House on 26 July, five days after Joe Biden stepped aside, recording a video of their phone conversation which promptly went viral. Michelle Obama said:
I can’t have this phone call without saying to my girl Kamala that I am so proud of you – this is going to be historic.
Independent presidential candidate Robert F Kennedy Jr. and his running mate, tech lawyer Nicole Shanahan, are considering dropping out of the race and supporting Donald Trump, Shanahan said.
In a interview on the End Tribalism in Politics podcast that aired today, reported by the Washington Post, Shanahan said:
There’s two options that we’re looking at and one is staying in, forming that new party, but we run the risk of a Kamala Harris and Waltz presidency because we draw more votes from Trump.
Or we walk away right now and join forces with with Donald Trump and explain to our base why we’re making this decision.
RFK’s VP Nicole Shanahan says they are debating whether to stay in the race or drop out and join forces with Trump:
— End Tribalism in Politics (@EndTribalism) August 20, 2024
“There’s two options that we're looking at and one is staying in, forming that new party, but we run the risk of a Kamala Harris and Waltz presidency because we… pic.twitter.com/O3HrLbbCLO
13 protesters arrested during first day of convention, says Chicago police
Chicago police said there was a “brief breach” of security fencing “within sight and sound of the United Center” on Monday evening.
Some 13 people were arrested on charges ranging from criminal trespass and resisting and obstructing an arrest to aggravated battery of police officers, Chicago police superintendent Larry Snelling said, AP reported.
An estimated 3,500 protesters participated in the march and rally, Snelling told a news conference on Tuesday, adding that just a small group breached the security fence. The vast majority of protesters were peaceful, he said, adding:
I’m not going to tie that event – what happened with the breach – with the entirety of the protest.
Updated
Donald Trump said he would not enforce a 150-year-old federal law to restrict the sale of abortion medication by mail.
Trump was asked in an interview with CBS whether he would enforce the Comstock Act, a 1873 law that Trump allies have eyed as a way to ban all abortions nationwide under a second Trump administration. He replied:
No. We will be discussing specifics of it, but generally speaking, no, I would not.
Donald Trump, when asked whether he would enforce the Comstock Act of 1873 to restrict sending medication abortion by mail:
— The Recount (@therecount) August 20, 2024
"No. We will be discussing specifics of it, but generally speaking, no, I would not." pic.twitter.com/c9mWM43oPe
In its 920-page blueprint for a second Trump administration, the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 calls for enforcing Comstock’s criminal prohibitions to provide or distribute abortion pills.
John Giles, the mayor of Mesa, Arizona, is among the Republicans who will be speaking at the Democratic national convention this week.
Giles, who is expected to speak at the convention today, released a statement:
I’ve been a Republican all my life. But since Donald Trump refused to accept the results of the 2020 election, the Republican Party has spiraled further and further into political extremism.
Last month, Giles wrote an op-ed in the Arizona Republic calling on Republicans to join him in “choosing country over party this election and to vote against Donald Trump.”
Adam Kinzinger, a former Republican congressman for Illinois, has also confirmed that he will be speaking at the Democratic national convention this week.
Kinzinger, posting to X this morning, said that he will be using his speech on Thursday to argue that “true conservatism has been replaced with a cult”.
I can now report that I will be speaking Thursday at the Democratic National Convention.
— Adam Kinzinger (Slava Ukraini) 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 (@AdamKinzinger) August 20, 2024
True conservatism has been replaced with a cult. I’ll be making that clear.
Geoff Duncan, a Republican former lieutenant governor of Georgia, will speak at the Democratic convention this week, the Harris campaign has announced.
Duncan will have a “prominent” speaking slot on Wednesday night, CNN reported, citing a source familiar with the speech. Duncan’s remarks will be “directed at Republicans who are sick and tired of making excuses for Donald Trump,” the source said.
In a statement shared by Fox News, Duncan said:
As a lifelong conservative Republican, I do not recognize my own party. Donald Trump does not care about America’s working families; he only cares about revenge and retribution. Americans know Donald Trump’s extremist agenda is a threat to our country, and it’s time to move past his incoherence and division.
In May, Duncan said he would vote for Joe Biden because Trump had “disqualified himself through his conduct and his character.”
Updated
Trump to campaign in Michigan city a month after white supremacist rally
Donald Trump will deliver remarks on Tuesday in Howell, Michigan, a city with historical links to the Ku Klux Klan and where white supremacists marched through the streets last month and chanted “We love Hitler. We love Trump.”
Trump is scheduled to speak this afternoon about “crime and safety” at Livingston County Sheriff’s County in Howell, a city of about 10,000 residents northwest of Detroit. It will be Trump’s sixth visit to Michigan this year.
In the 1970s, KKK Grand Dragon Robert Miles had a Howell mailing address and held meetings on a nearby farm, Reuters reported. A cross burning on the lawn of a Black couple rocked the city in the 1980s, and it was the site of a KKK rally in the 1990s, CNN reported. Last month, about a dozen white supremacists chanted “Heil Hitler” and carried signs reading “White Lives Matter” during a march through downtown Howell.
Kamala Harris’s campaign has criticized Trump for planning the event in Howell while failing to condemn what it called a “blatant display of racism and antisemitism in his name.” A statement by the Harris campaign said:
The racists and white supremacists who marched in Trump’s name last month in Howell have all watched him praise Hitler, defend neo-Nazis in Charlottesville, and tell far-right extremists to ‘stand back and stand by. Trump’s actions have encouraged them, and Michiganders can expect more of the same when he comes to town.
A Trump campaign spokesperson rejected criticism of the site of the event, promising Trump would speak against “hate of any form”.
Former Trump press secretary Stephanie Grisham to speak at Democratic convention tonight
Stephanie Grisham, a former White House press secretary under the Trump administration, will speak at the Democratic national convention today to show her support for Kamala Harris.
Grisham worked in a number of different roles for Donald Trump – as a press aide during Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, as chief of staff and press secretary for then-first lady, Melania Trump, and as White House press secretary and communications director. She resigned in the aftermath of the 6 January 2021 attack on the US Capitol.
In a statement announcing her appearance at the Democratic national convention this week, Grisham said:
I never thought I’d be speaking at a Democratic convention. But, after seeing firsthand who Donald Trump really is, and the threat he poses to our country, I feel very strongly about speaking out.
Grisham, whose attendance at the DNC was first reported by NBC News, added:
While I don’t agree with Vice President Harris on everything, I am proud to be supporting her because I know she will defend our freedoms and represent our nation with honesty and integrity.
👋🏼. We’ll, I’m doing a thing tonight. #RepublicansForHarris https://t.co/nR2uKyq6yq
— Stephanie Grisham (@OMGrisham) August 20, 2024
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Roy Cooper, the Democratic governor of North Carolina, said he has “that 2008 feeling” about the party’s chances of winning his state with Kamala Harris on the top of the ticket.
Cooper, speaking at a Bloomberg event at the Democratic national convention on Tuesday reported by AP, acknowledged that he did not have the same optimism about his state just weeks ago, when Joe Biden was at the top of the ticket.
Before Biden dropped out, Democrats “were not united, Cooper said, adding that he was “grateful” for the president’s decision to step aside “because it brought everybody together.”
“Everyone loves President Biden,” he said, but added of the decision to drop out:
It was the time to do this, it was the time to make history.
The Democratic national convention’s programming tonight will begin earlier after how late it ran last night, CNN is reporting, citing DNC organizers.
Organizers say tonight's convention programming will begin earlier after how late last night ran, per @betsy_klein.
— Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) August 20, 2024
Doors at the United Center in Chicago are scheduled to open at 4pm CT, with main programming beginning at 6pm CT.
The theme for today’s edition of the convention will be “A Bold Vision for America’s Future”.
As the presidential election approaches, a recently designated neo-Nazi terrorist group is covertly seeding violent propaganda on to mainstream social media channels – exposing tens of thousands of unknowing followers to radicalizing messages – according to background research and a report provided to the Guardian by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD).
One of those channels on Telegram purports to be associated with Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast, with an administrator claiming in group chats discovered by ISD to have had direct contact with the longtime Donald Trump ally who is well-known for playing footsie with extremists and admitting to fomenting revolution.
The UK government listed the Terrogram collective as an official terrorist entity in April. The move spiked public interest in the shadowy network of violent neo-Nazi propagandists on Telegram that preaches accelerationism, which demands followers hasten the collapse of society through acts of terrorism.
Terrorgram has already had success inspiring adherents. The Bratislava shooter who killed two people outside of a gay bar in 2022 cited it in his manifesto. Just last week, a teenage suspected supporter in Turkey carried out a mass stabbing at a mosque. Followers of Terrorgram in Canada and in the US have already been subject to terrorism-related charges in recent years.
Read the full report here: Neo-Nazi terrorist group using Steve Bannon account to radicalize people
Crews are adding fencing to the security perimeter near the United Center ahead of the second day of the Democratic national convention, after protesters breached the outer perimeter fence on Monday.
From CBS News’ Darius Johnson:
RIGHT NOW: Crews are adding fencing at Washington and Wolcott in the secure perimeter near the United Center where the DNC is being held. This comes after protesters breached the fence yesterday to get closer to the convention. Several were arrested. @cbschicago #DNC2024 pic.twitter.com/LEupxhJl4R
— Darius Johnson (DJ) (@DariusJohnsonTV) August 20, 2024
Dozens of protesters appeared to break through one security fence near the convention site on Monday and several demonstrators were handcuffed and detained.
As we reported earlier, the Chicago chapter of the National Lawyers Guild said 12 protesters were arrested on Monday.
Chicago police are expected to hold a press conference later this morning.
Key takeaways from night one of the Democratic national convention
The Democratic national convention kicked off Monday in Chicago, just one month after Joe Biden withdrew his candidacy and paved the way for Kamala Harris to take over the ticket. Here are key takeaways from the day:
1. Joe Biden passed the torch: ‘America, I gave my best to you’: Biden revisited some of the darkest chapters of the Trump administration, including the January 6 insurrection, and attacked Donald Trump’s vision of America, saying, “He says we’re losing. He’s the loser.” He earned loud applause for his praise of Kamala Harris, saying selecting her as vice-president was the “best decision I made my whole career”, and, “Crime will keep coming down when we put a prosecutor in the office instead of a convicted felon.”
2. Ocasio-Cortez energized the crowd and praised Harris’s ceasefire efforts: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez gave one of the most energetic speeches of the night, talking about her roots as a bartender and saying that Harris “understands the urgency of rent checks and groceries and prescriptions. She is as committed to our reproductive and civil rights as she is to taking on corporate greed.” The progressive congresswoman and “Squad” member also earned loud applause for saying that Harris was “working tirelessly to secure a ceasefire in Gaza and bringing hostages home”.
3. Hillary Clinton said Kamala Harris will break the ‘glass ceiling’: Hillary Clinton, the former secretary of state and 2016 presidential candidate, also gave an impassioned speech, outlining the historic nature of Harris’s nomination: “When a barrier falls for one of us, it falls and clears the way for all of us.” Clinton drew a sharp contrast between Harris, a former prosecutor, and Trump who “fell asleep at his own trial, and when he woke up, he made his own kind of history … the first person to run for president with 34 felony convictions”. The remark sparked “lock him up” chants, a throwback to the “lock her up” chants Clinton faced in 2016 at Trump rallies.
4. Democrats rallied around abortion rights and stopping Project 2025: Speakers from red states gave personal accounts of the impacts of abortion bans. Hadley Duvall, from Kentucky, described how she was raped by her stepfather and became pregnant at age 12: “I can’t imagine not having a choice. But today, that’s the reality for many women and girls across the country because of Donald Trump’s abortion bans.” Speakers also repeatedly tied the Trump and the Republican agenda to Project 2025, the roadmap for a second Trump administration crafted by former Trump officials. Mallory McMorrow, a state senator from Michigan, held a copy of the Project 2025 document and assailed the plan to “turn Donald Trump into a dictator”. Congressman Jim Clyburn called Project 2025 “Jim Crow 2.0”. Biden noted that the project calls for the dismantling of the US department of education.
5. Kamala Harris gave surprise remarks: Kamala Harris made a surprise appearance at the convention on Monday night to Joe Biden for his service. Harris, who is due to give her formal speech at the end of the week, electrified the crowd when she entered the stage, with Beyoncé’s Freedom playing in the background.
6. Thousands protested outside the DNC: Thousands of pro-Palestinian protesters gathered outside the Democratic National Convention, calling for a ceasefire and arms embargo on Israel. Dozens of protesters appeared to break through one security fence near the convention site and several demonstrators were handcuffed and detained. During Biden’s speech, demonstrators unfurled a “Stop Arming Israel” banner, but the speech continued uninterrupted. There was limited talk of Gaza on the convention floor, though Biden reiterated his efforts to secure a ceasefire and said, “Those protesters out in the street, they have a point – a lot of innocent people are being killed, on both sides.” The Democratic party’s official platform released before the convention did not include an arms embargo, a key demand by uncommitted delegates.
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A dozen people were arrested during yesterday’s demonstrations outside the United Center in Chicago, where the Democratic national convention took place, according to the Chicago chapter of the National Lawyers Guild.
According to the guild, a total of 14 protesters have been arrested as of Monday night. It said that two people have required hospitalization as a result of their arrests by Chicago police.
A statement posted on social media reads:
The Chicago chapter of the National Lawyers Guild (NLG) is condemning the aggressive and, at times, violent response by the Chicago Police Department (CPD) toward protesters at the start of the Democratic National Convention (DNC).
Both protesters arrested on Sunday were held for hours before being allowed to speak to a lawyer, and were not allowed to make private phone calls with attorneys at the police station in violation of CPD policies and procedures and the law.
Per @NLGChicago this morning: "a total of 14 protesters have been arrested as of Monday night, including two on Sunday and 12 on Monday. Two protesters have needed hospitalization as a result of their arrests by CPD."
— Jinx Press (at DNC) (@JinxPress) August 20, 2024
Joe Biden and his family are vacationing for the rest of the week in Santa Ynez, California in the heart of Santa Barbara wine country.
The Bidens arrived early this morning at the ranch of Joe Kiani, a longtime Democratic donor and the founder of Masimo and Cercacor Laboratories.
Biden has called Kiani “one of my closest friends” and in 2021 appointed him to the President’s council of advisers on science and technology. Kiani has also previously hosted the president’s son, Hunter Biden.
Asked if the president was going to California to “lay low” for Kamala Harris during the Democratic national convention, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Biden is “very much continuing to be the president, the commander in chief”. She told reporters:
He’s going to spend time with his family. I think that’s important for any families to do. Presidents are never on vacation.
He’s a president wherever he is. He’s certainly going to continue to be doing the work, going to be very much focused and getting updates – for example, what’s happening in the Middle East; foreign policy, more broadly, and also domestic.
Harris and Walz to attend rally in battleground Wisconsin
Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota governor Tim Walz, will attend a campaign rally in Wisconsin today where she is scheduled to deliver remarks at around 8pm CT.
Other attendees joining Harris and Walz at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee include congresswoman Gwen Moore, Milwaukee mayor Cavalier Johnson, labor leaders, and members of the Milwaukee Bucks franchise, the Harris Walz campaign said.
It marks Harris’s seventh visit to Wisconsin this year and her third since becoming the Democratic presidential candidate.
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Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez delivered a rousing speech at the Democratic national convention on Monday, offering a full-throated endorsement of Kamala Harris and outlining a sweeping progressive vision for the next administration. Ocasio-Cortez said:
America, when we knock on our neighbor’s door, organize our communities and elect Kamala Harris to the presidency on 5 November, we will send a loud message that the people of this nation will not go back. We choose a new path and open the door to a new day: one that is for the people and by the people.
The New York congresswoman was greeted by the convention crowd in Chicago with loud applause and cheers of “AOC! AOC!” Ocasio-Cortez has won praise for her ability to effectively communicate with voters in an accessible way, promised Harris would be a voice for working Americans and issued a stark warning against reelecting Trump.
Hillary Clinton, in her speech on Monday, revelled in the chance to turn the tables on Donald Trump, as she drew a parallel between the slights she endured at the hands of the Republican candidate in 2016 and the insults he continues to hurl at Kamala Harris in 2024.
It is no surprise that he is lying about Kamala’s record, he is mocking her name and her laugh. Sounds familiar?
Clinton compared Trump’s record as a convicted felon with Harris’s as a former prosecutor.
As a prosecutor, Kamala locked up murders and drug traffickers. Donald Trump fell asleep at his own trial.
At that moment the thousands of Democratic delegates amassed on the DNC floor spontaneously burst into chants of “Lock him up! Lock him up!” It was an ironic echo of the chant that was repeatedly directed against Clinton by Trump supporters, with his blessing, in 2016.
Clinton, with the diplomacy behoving a former secretary of state, made no comment. But the way she nodded her head in synch to the chants spoke volumes.
Hillary Clinton pins hope on Harris to ‘break through’ glass ceiling
Hillary Clinton gave one of the most powerful speeches of her career in politics on Monday as she implored American voters finally to crack the “highest, hardest glass ceiling” that had eluded her so bitterly eight years ago.
In a rousing 15-minute speech at the Democratic national convention in Chicago, Clinton returned to the theme that she intended to invoke in a victory speech on election night, 8 November 2016. That speech was never delivered, the glass ceiling standing firm in the wake of her shock defeat to Donald Trump. But what she had failed to attain was within the grasp of Kamala Harris, only the second woman to be nominated at the top of a major party presidential ticket.
And the man who had derided and humiliated Clinton on the campaign trail back in 2016, mocking her as “Crooked” and “Lyin’ Hillary”, was now on the defensive. “We have him on the run now,” Clinton said.
Clinton made little effort to hide that for her the hope of pushing Harris into the White House as the first female US president was profoundly personal. “We are so close to breaking through once and for all,” she said, conjuring up the image of Harris raising her hand “on the other side of that glass ceiling” to take the presidential oath of office.
This is our time America. This is when we stand up, this is when we break through.
Kamala Harris made a surprise appearance at the Democratic national convention on Monday night, taking the stage to thank Joe Biden for his service to the country.
“This is going to be a great week, and I want to kick us off by celebrating our incredible president, Joe Biden, who will be speaking later tonight,” she said.
Joe, thank you for your historic leadership, for your lifetime of service to our nation, and for all you will continue to do, we are forever grateful to you. Thank you, Joe!
Harris, dressed in a tan suit, kept her remarks brief, taking in the enthusiasm from the delegates and convention attenders that were on their feet cheering and chanting. “Looking out at everyone tonight, I see the beauty of our great nation,” the vice-president said.
Harris walked out to Beyoncé’s Freedom, which has become her campaign anthem. Beyoncé’s name has been floated by various sources as a potential surprise musical performance at the Democratic convention.
Pro-Palestinian protesters 'have a point', Biden says as thousands join Gaza demonstrations
Thousands of pro-Palestinian protesters gathered outside the Democratic national convention on Monday to demand that the US end military aid to Israel for its ongoing war in Gaza. Activists have branded Joe Biden “Genocide Joe” and called for the vice-president, Kamala Harris, to change course.
The Democrats have been eager to avoid any repeat of their Chicago convention in 1968, when anti-Vietnam war protests and a police riot led to scenes of chaos that stunned the nation and contributed to the party’s defeat in November.
The biggest protest group the Coalition to March on the DNC planned demonstrations for Monday and Thursday to coincide with Biden and Harris’s speeches. Organizers said they expected at least 20,000 activists to demonstrate, including students who protested against the war on college campuses.
On Monday, dozens of protesters appeared to break through one security fence near the convention site and several demonstrators were handcuffed and detained. During Biden’s speech, demonstrators unfurled a “Stop Arming Israel” banner, but the speech continued uninterrupted.
There was limited talk of Gaza on the convention floor, though Biden reiterated his efforts to secure a ceasefire and said:
Those protesters out in the street, they have a point – a lot of innocent people are being killed, on both sides.
Updated
Joe Biden described selecting Kamala Harris as his vice-president as “the best decision I made my whole career”, and he drew a sharp contrast between her and Donald Trump. Mocking Trump over his recent conviction on 34 felony counts, Biden said:
Violent crime has dropped to the lowest level of more than 50 years, and crime will keep coming down when we put a prosecutor in the Oval Office instead of a convicted felon.
Biden landed other punches against Trump as well, attacking the Republican nominee for describing America as a “failing nation”. Biden said to loud cheers:
When he talks about America being a failing nation, he says, we’re losing. He’s the loser. He’s dead wrong.
Still, Biden made a point to credit Harris with helping to deliver change. When discussing his administration’s efforts to lower prescription drug prices, Biden said:
Guess who cast the tie-breaking vote? Vice-president, soon-to-be-president, Kamala Harris.
And when audience members repeatedly broke out in chants of “Thank you, Joe,” the president responded, “Thank you, Kamala!”
Biden urges voters to ‘preserve democracy’ in hopeful DNC speech
Just one month after making the historic choice to withdraw from the presidential race, Joe Biden took the stage at the Democratic national convention on Monday to deliver a reflective and optimistic address, urging the nation to elect Kamala Harris to protect American democracy.
Looking back on his one and only presidential term, Biden reminded Americans that he took office just two weeks after the January 6 attack on the US Capitol, when the country was still in the early grips of the coronavirus pandemic.
“Yet, I believe then and I believe now, that progress was and is possible. Justice is achievable, and our best days are not behind us. They’re before us,” Biden said.
With a grateful heart, I stand before you now on this August night to report that democracy has prevailed. Democracy has delivered, and now democracy must be preserved.
Here’s a clip from Biden’s speech last night:
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Reuters has some hints about what we can expect from Barack and Michelle Obama’s speeches later today.
According to the news wire’s sources, Barack Obama will outline what he believes will lift Kamala Harris to victory while also warning Democrats about the tough task they face over the next 11 weeks taking on Donald Trump in the run-up to polling day.
The former first lady is expected to emphasize the need for the country to turn the page on fear and division. In 2016, she offered a memorable catchphrase of “When they go low, we go high” in a speech supporting Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.
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The Harris campaign said on Tuesday that it will spotlight “trusted messengers” from key battleground states over the convention’s three remaining days.
They include Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada; Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Sen. Gary Peters and Rep. Elissa Slotkin of Michigan; Sen. Bob Casey of Pennsylvania and Sen. Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin. From Arizona, Sen. Mark Kelly will speak along with John Giles, the Republican mayor of Mesa.
Gov. Roy Cooper of North Carolina will be the last speaker before Harris accepts the Democratic nomination on Thursday.
Kamala Harris will travel on Tuesday to Milwaukee for a rally in the swing state of Wisconsin before returning to Chicago late in the evening.
Meanwhile, as Reuters reports, her opponent Donald Trump will visit a Michigan town on Tuesday one month after white supremacists rallied there.
The news has sparking renewed criticism from Democrats who accuse his campaign of stirring up racial tensions for political gain.
Trump is scheduled to talk about “crime and safety” at the Livingston County Sheriff’s Office in Howell, a town of some 10,000 people northwest of Detroit.
A Trump campaign spokesperson rejected criticism of the site of the event, promising Trump would speak against “hate of any form”.
About a dozen white supremacists chanted “Heil Hitler” and carried signs reading “White Lives Matter” during a march through downtown Howell last month. According to local media, another group of demonstrators shouted, “We love Hitler, we love Trump” from a highway overpass just outside Howell.
Updated
After the former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley dropped out of the Republican primary earlier this year, some conservatives across the US continued to vote for her in subsequent primaries, casting ballots that indicated dissent within a party that has otherwise fully embraced Donald Trump.
When Haley finally announced that she would be supporting the ex-president in the upcoming election, she said that it was on him to mobilize her loyalists.
But it was the Biden campaign, not Trump’s, that actively began engaging Haley voters. “I want to be clear: There is a place for you in my campaign,” Joe Biden wrote on Twitter/X alongside an ad targeting Haley voters.
With the president out of the race now, some of those former Haley voters have organized behind Democratic candidate Kamala Harris in a political action group called Haley Voters for Harris.
You can read the full story here about the voters that have made the surprising switch
The opening day of the DNC reportedly ran more than an hour behind schedule and forced some planned speakers, including musician James Taylor, to be dropped from the program, which convention organizers attributed to sustained applause for speakers.
Doug Emhoff, 'the second gentleman', to address DNC on Tuesday
Kamala Harris’s husband, Doug Emhoff, is also due to address the DNC later today, Associated Press reports.
The second gentleman has previously described being caught by surprise by the timing of Joe Biden’s announcement that he was dropping out of his re-election campaign, saying he was in an exercise class in Los Angeles when he heard the news.
Emhoff, 59, said a friend showed him his phone with news notifications and saying: “Um, you need to look at this.’”
“Of course I didn’t have my phone, so I ran and ran and got into our car, and of course my phone is just on fire, and it’s basically, ‘Call Kamala,’ ‘Call Kamala,’ ‘Call Kamala,’ from everyone,” Emhoff continued, according to the LA Times. “And of course, the first thing she said was, ‘Where the ... were you? I need you.’”
Presumably Emhoff will be better prepared for his address today.
The DNC continues today following an electrifying address from Joe Biden on Monday night. As our Washington bureau chief, David Smith, writes:
More than 20,000 stood, applauded, roared and chanted, “We love Joe.” They held tall narrow signs that said, “We ♥️ Joe” … It was the culmination of a night that for Biden must have felt either like receiving an honorary Oscar or giving the oration at his own funeral.
In the speech, he attacked Donald Trump – “You cannot say you love your country only when you win” and, as Smith says:
He was a man unburdened, liberated, unrecognisable from the doddering June debate.
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Obamas to address conference on Tuesday
Good morning and welcome to our coverage of the Democratic National Convention.
Barack and Michelle Obama and Bernie Sanders are due to address the crowds in Chicago later, following a rapturous reception for Joe Biden’s speech on Monday.
The Obamas’ endorsement of Kamala Harris in July was seminal in securing the Democratic presidential nomination for the current US vice-president, helping to bypass a potentially ugly internal fight.
As Ed Pilkington writes, today’s convention will also see almost 5,000 delegates from all 50 states and US territories gather on the floor of the United Center to hold what is being billed as a “ceremonial roll call” symbolically to hand the Democratic nomination to Harris.
The event will be purely figurative: Harris was officially elevated into that position two weeks ago through an online vote of delegates.
You can read the full story here:
Other Monday highlights include a surprise appearance by Harris herself, taking the stage to thank Biden for his service to the country. She will cap the convention with her speech on Thursday. Also on Monday:
Thousands of pro-Palestinian protesters gathered outside the Democratic National Convention, calling for a ceasefire and arms embargo on Israel. Dozens of protesters appeared to break through one security fence near the convention site and several demonstrators were handcuffed and detained. During Biden’s speech, demonstrators unfurled a “Stop Arming Israel” banner.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez told the convention: “America has before us a rare and precious opportunity in Kamala Harris … She understands the urgency of rent checks and groceries and prescriptions. She is as committed to our reproductive and civil rights as she is to taking on corporate greed.”
Hillary Clinton outlined the historic nature of Harris’s nomination: “I see the freedom to look our children in the eye and say, ‘In America, you can go as far as your hard work and talent will take you,’ and mean it. And you know what? On the other side of that glass ceiling is Kamala Harris, raising her hand and taking the oath of office as our 47th president.”
Speakers from red states gave personal accounts of the impacts of abortion bans. Hadley Duvall, from Kentucky, described how she was raped by her stepfather and became pregnant at age 12: “I can’t imagine not having a choice. But today, that’s the reality for many women and girls across the country because of Donald Trump’s abortion bans.”
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