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Harris’ blitz to define herself as Trump’s team races to beat her to it
(WASHINGTON) — Since getting thrust into the race for president after President Joe Biden announced on Sunday he would step aside, Vice President Kamala Harris and her team have been racing to define her to the American people as their attention turns to the newly energized campaign before Donald Trump could beat her to the punch.
In a shift, the vice president, who has served as San Francisco’s district attorney and California’s attorney general, is leaning heavily into that part of her resume — which was largely a liability during her 2020 bid for the presidency, a campaign she abandoned before the first voters were cast in that primary.
“In those roles, I took on perpetrators of all kinds,” Harris told staffers at her campaign headquarters Monday in what was officially her first campaign event since getting in the race. “Predators who abused women, fraudsters who ripped off consumers, cheaters who broke the rules for their own gain.”
“So, hear me when I say I know Donald Trump’s type,” she added. “And in this campaign, I will proudly put my record against his.”
It’s a framing of prosecutor vs. convict that Harris and her team have pushed aggressively in early days of her nascent campaign
On Thursday, Harris attacked Trump over his legal woes in the first ad of her campaign. In it Harris said her vision of the future includes an America “where no one is above the law” as the former president’s mugshot and newspaper headlines following his conviction on 34 counts in New York flashed on screen.
“Their campaign says, ‘I’m the prosecutor and he is the convicted felon,” Trump said at a rally in Charlotte, North Carolina, his first since Biden dropped out. “That’s their campaign. I don’t think people are gonna buy it.”
Harris has also worked to define the race as being between someone who is fighting to protect Americans’ freedoms and Donald Trump, who she argues will strip them of their freedom.
“In this election, we each face a question: What kind of country do we want to live in?” Harris asked in that first ad titled “We Choose Freedom” and that features Beyonce’s “Freedom,” which the vice president walks out to at rallies.
“There are some people who think we should be a country of chaos. Of fear. Of hate,” she adds over images of Trump and his running mate, Sen. JD Vance of Ohio. “But us? We choose something different; we choose freedom.”
Speaking at the American Federation of Teachers convention in Houston Thursday, Harris said, “In this moment, across our nation, we witness a full-on attack on hard-won, hard-fought freedoms.”
Harris, said that those freedoms include the right to an abortion, pointing to the Supreme Court’s overuling of Roe v. Wade, for which she blames Trump, and vowing to fight to restore them.
“When I am president of the United States and when Congress passes a law to restore those freedoms, I will sign it into law. We are not playing around,” she said at the historically Black Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc.’s Grand Boulé in Indianapolis on Wednesday.
But the Trump campaign is trying to define Harris in ways they think could hurt her prospects and that they hope the American people will buy.
Sources told ABC News that Trump’s attacks will largely focus on Harris’ role leading the administration’s effort on the migrant crisis and use it to make the case that the administration failed to secure the border.
Prior to Biden stepping down, Trump began ramping up personal attacks against the vice president, going after her laugh by nicknaming her “Laffin’ Kamala” and dubbing her “nuts.”
“You can tell a lot by a laugh,” Trump said at a rally in Michigan on Saturday. “I call her Laffin’ Kamala. You ever watch her laugh?… She’s crazy. She’s nuts.”
At the North Carolina rally he unleashed a barrage of false claims, referring to her as “Lyin’ Kamala Harris,” as a “radical-left lunatic” and a liar before suggesting that she is okay with the “execution” of a baby.
“She wants abortions in the eighth and ninth month of pregnancy, that’s fine with her right up until birth. And even after birth, the execution of a baby because that’s not abortion. That’s the execution of a baby,” Trump falsely claimed before touting the U.S. Supreme Court decision that sent the issue back to the states.
In the early days of his administration, Biden tasked Harris with leading his administration’s efforts to address the root causes of migration, primarily tackling economic and social issues in the Northern Triangle countries of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras. But in the face of migrant surges at the border, Republicans have placed blame on Harris, who they disparagingly, inaccurately nickname the “border czar.”
“Kamala Harris was appointed border czar, as you know, in March of 2021 and since that time, millions and millions of illegal aliens have invaded our country and countless Americans have been killed by migrant crime because of her,” Trump said during a press call Tuesday.
The Harris campaign responded to these attacks by pointing the finger at Trump for his opposition to a bipartisan deal to secure the border and address immigration.
“The only ‘plan’ Donald Trump has to secure our border is ripping mothers from their children aand a few xenophobic placards at the Republican National Convention. He tanked the bipartisan border security deal because, for Donald Trump, this has never been about solutions just running on a problem,” Harris campaign spokesperson Kevin Munoz said in a statement.
“Like everything with Donald Trump, it’s never been about helping the country, it’s only about helping himself,” Munoz added. “There’s only one candidate in this race who will fight for bipartisan solutions to strengthen border security, and that’s Vice President Harris.”
Trump allies, in a sign they are struggling to define Harris, have also resorted to describing the presumptive nominee as someone who is unqualified and chosen because of her race and gender, with some calling her a so-called “DEI” (diversity, equity, and inclusion) candidate.
Former presidential candidate Nikki Haley, who is now a supporter of Trump, told CNN’s Jake Tapper on Thursday that these attacks are “not helpful.”
Harris has seized being thrust into the spotlight with her newly minted campaign, positioning herself as leader during moments she would otherwise have to wait for Biden’s lead.
After meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu–separately from Biden’s own meeting—Harris came before the cameras to outline her view on the war in Gaza, which had become a political headache for the president in recent months. (Biden, himself, did not speak with reporters after his meeting.)
Biden has been plagued domestically over criticism of his response to the war and for not being more forceful against Netanyahu as scores of civilians get killed in Gaza, and for continuing to supply Israel with weapons.
And although her policy stances on the war largely don’t stray far from Biden’s, Harris on Thursday notably signaled a future shift.
“We cannot allow ourselves to become numb to the suffering,” Harris said. “And I will not be silent.”
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At Comic-Con, ‘The Boys” creators tease new prequel spin-off, ‘Vought Rising’
At Prime Video’s panel for The Boys at San Diego Comic-Con on Friday, the show’s creator, Eric Kripke, announced that Jensen Ackles‘ popular Soldier Boy character and Aya Cash‘s Nazi-Supe Stormfront will have their own show, a prequel series called Vought Rising.
Ackles made a surprise appearance at the panel, which was moderated by The Boys season 4 star Jeffrey Dean Morgan. Cash popped up via video.
Vought Rising will be set in the 1950s, when, as the show’s name suggests, the multinational conglomerate-to- be was in its infancy, thanks to the superhero-producing formula known as Compound V.
Prime Video calls the “deranged” new spin-off “a twisted murder mystery about the origins of Vought in the 1950s, the early exploits of Soldier Boy, and the diabolical maneuvers of a Supe known to fans as Stormfront, who was then going by the name Clara Vought.”
The streaming service adds, “We cannot wait to blow your minds and trouble your souls with this salacious, grisly saga drenched in blood and Compound V.”
Ackles and Cash will serve as co-executive producers on the show.
Past spin-offs from the world of The Boys include Gen V and the animated The Boys Presents: Diabolical, both streaming exclusively on Prime Video.
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Fox renews animated ‘Krapopolis’ for season 4
At a panel for the animated show at San Diego Comic-Con, Fox revealed its animated series Krapopolis has been renewed for a fourth season — ahead of its second season premiere this fall.
“For all our Krap-devotees, there was no better place to decree another season of Krapopolis than the annual San Diego Comic-Con fan fest and no one better to deliver the proclamation than our brilliant creator and executive producer, Dan Harmon,” said Fox TV President Michael Thorn.
“Dan and his team have created something special with this series, and now that season 4 is etched in stone, we’ll be keeping those once-in-a-millennia laughs rolling,” he continued in part.
The show from Rick & Morty co-creator Harmon is a twisted take on ancient Greek mythology, telling the story “of a dysfunctional family of humans, gods and monsters that try their hand at running the world’s first cities – without trying to kill each other, first.”
The cast includes Richard Ayoade, who plays Tyrannis. His character’s parents are What We Do in the Shadows’ Matt Berry (Shlub) and Ted Lasso‘s Hannah Waddingham, who just earned Krapopolis‘ first Emmy nomination, for voicing Tyrannis’ mom, Deliria, the “goddess of self-destruction and questionable choices.”
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‘Alpha Cop’: Ryan Reynolds reveals scrapped plan to “hide” ‘Deadpool & Wolverine’ inside “horrible” fake movie
In an appearance opposite his costar Hugh Jackman on First We Feast’s Hot Ones show, Reynolds revealed his initial plan was to “hide” Deadpool & Wolverine inside an “intentionally bad” movie.
“The original idea with this movie was to shoot a fake movie called Alpha Cop, that was intentionally bad,” said Reynolds, adding he even had a poster made for the phony film, with the tagline, “Two cops, one brain, all b****.”
“It was about two guys that were sharing one brain and together they make the ultimate cop,” Ryan said.
Reynolds and Jackman would have starred in Alpha Cop, having filmed the real movie “in secret,” the actor-producer says.
He explained, “Like 10 people in America would go to see this movie on opening weekend and five minutes into the movie the Marvel logo would flip up and it would actually be Deadpool & Wolverine.”
But the very high stakes bait and switch had a very real danger, so the plan was scrapped. “The problem is that if you managed to get down to the last minute and [the cover] got blown, it would just be heartbreaking,” Ryan said.
While it’s unknown what Alpha Cop would have made in sneaks, the real movie has already set box office records.
Deadpool & Wolverine made $38.5 million from previews on Thursday alone: That’s the best-ever sneak preview showing for an R-rated film and the eighth highest sneak preview performance ever, adjusted for inflation.
For the record, it missed #7 on the list, Avengers: Infinity War, by only 1 million bucks.
According to the website The Numbers, Avengers: Endgame set the all-time record with $60 million before it actually opened.
Marvel Studios is owned by ABC News’ parent company Disney.
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What to know about the updated COVID vaccines coming this fall
(NEW YORK) — As summer begins to wind down and many children and teenagers across the U.S. get ready to head back to school next month, it also means updated COVID-19 vaccines are around the corner.
Last month, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended Americans receive the updated 2024-25 vaccine when it becomes available later this year.
Health officials have used the term “updated vaccines” in anticipation of needing to formulate a new vaccine every year to match circulating variants as is done for the flu shot.
“Historically, when we’re talking about COVID vaccines, we’re talking about boosters that would happen at some time post your previous vaccine,” said Dr. John Brownstein, an epidemiologist and chief innovation officer at Boston Children’s Hospital and an ABC News contributor.
“Now we’re targeting annual vaccines for COVID-19 that is similar to flu. It’s a reformulation based on what’s circulating, and this is why we’re talking about an annual campaign rather than a booster,” he continued.
Here’s what you need to know about the updated COVID vaccines:
What variants does it target?
The updated 2024-25 COVID-19 vaccines will target the JN.1 lineage of the virus, an offshoot of the omicron variant.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has asked manufacturers to formulate a vaccine that closely matches the KP.2 strain of JN.1.
Who is eligible?
The CDC recommends everyone ages 6 months and older receive an updated vaccine.
Vaccines from Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna will be available for those 6 months old and older while the Novavax vaccine will be available for those aged 12 and older.
When will the vaccines be available?
Updated vaccines from Pfizer, Moderna and Novavax will be available in either August or September.
The CDC has said that it is safe to receive a COVID-19 vaccine at the same time as a flu shot or an RSV vaccine, for those who are being eligible.
For those who decide to get multiple vaccines in one appointment, “we suggest probably using different [arms] so you don’t exacerbate tenderness at the injection site,” Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, a professor of medicine and infectious disease specialists at University of California, San Francisco, told ABC News. “But essentially, you can get all three at the same time.”
Are the vaccines free?
Those who are covered by Medicare, Medicaid or private insurance will receive coverage for the updated vaccines.
In previous years, the CDC had a Bridge Access Program that provided free COVID-19 vaccines to adults without health insurance and adults whose insurance does not cover all COVID-19 vaccine costs. The program is ending in August 2024.
“This year we won’t have the luxury of having the Bridge Program be a safety gap,” Chin-Hong said. “Those who have no insurance, which comprises millions of Americans, will have to be covered by different states’ safety net programs.”
For children whose parents or guardians cannot afford vaccine coverage for them, there is the federally funded Vaccines for Children Program, which provides access to vaccines.
Why should I receive a vaccine?
Data has shown that COVID-19 vaccines can reduce the risk of severe disease, hospitalization and death as well as lower the risk of developing long COVID.
A September 2023 analysis by the CDC suggested making the COVID-19 vaccine recommendation universal could prevent about 400,000 hospitalizations and 40,000 deaths over the next two years.
“We have to remember that this virus is constantly changing, and that your protection from previous infection or from previous vaccines declines over time,” Brownstein said. “Making sure that you receive the most updated formulations of vaccine will ensure that you have the most recent protection and we of course assumed that like previous years.”
He added that protection from the updated vaccines will likely last through the winter months, when cases typically increase and, as a result, hospitalizations and deaths increase as well.
Chin-Hong said it’s important for those who are at risk of serious disease and hospitalization to get vaccinated including those who are older and immunocompromised as well as those who live with high-risk individuals to prevent spread.
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Vance responds to ‘childless cat ladies’ backlash, claims Democrats are ‘anti-family’
(WASHINGTON) — Vice presidential candidate Sen. JD Vance went on the “Megyn Kelly Show” podcast Friday to defend his past remarks where he questioned Democratic leaders, including Vice President Kamala Harris, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, for not having biological children, referring to them as “childless cat ladies.”
Vance made the comments in 2021, but they have recently resurfaced after former first lady Hillary Clinton shared a clip of the comments on X earlier this week — a little more than a week after Trump picked Vance as his running mate. Harris — who was among those Vance attacked — has secured commitments from enough delegates to become the presumptive Democratic nominee if they all honor their commitment when voting, according to ABC News reporting.
“We are effectively run in this country via the Democrats, via our corporate oligarchs, by a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too,” Vance said in the 2021 Fox News interview.
The main argument Vance made during his Friday interview with Kelly is that the Democratic Party is “anti-family” and that his criticism was not directed at those who don’t have kids.
“The simple point that I made is that having children, becoming a father, becoming a mother, I really do think it changes your perspective in a pretty profound way,” Vance told Kelly.
“I explicitly said in my remarks, despite the fact that the media has lied about this, that this is not about criticizing people who, for various reasons, didn’t have kids. This is about criticizing the Democratic Party for becoming anti-family and anti-child,” he added.
Vance’s original comments form 2021 mentioned the “choices” those Democrats had made that led them to be “miserable” and “childless cat ladies.”
While Vance claims Democrats are “anti-family and anti-child,” President Joe Biden and Harris have advocated for the child tax credit. The expanded child tax credit put in place during COVID expired in 2021 after pressure from Republicans and independent Joe Manchin. Democrats continue to fight to bring it back — with Biden calling for it to be put back in place in his FY2025 budget.
Vance said in the interview that he hopes parents realize he’s fighting for them.
“I’m proud to stand up for parents, and I hope the parents out there recognize that I’m a guy who wants to fight for you. I want to fight for your interests. I want to fight for your stake in the country. And that is what this is fundamentally about,” Vance said.
But Vance’s past comments have received massive backlash.
Kerstin Emhoff, mother to Cole and Ella Emhoff and the ex-wife of second gentleman Doug Emhoff, called Vance’s “cat lady” comments “baseless attacks.”
“For over 10 years, since Cole and Ella were teenagers, Kamala has been a co-parent with Doug and I. She is loving, nurturing, fiercely protective, and always present. I love our blended family and am grateful to have her in it,” Kerstin Emhoff said.
Ella Emhoff, the daughter of second gentleman Doug Emhoff and Harris’ stepdaughter, posted on her story on Instagram, “I love my three parents” while highlighting her mom’s statement. She asked “How can you be ‘childless’ when you have cutie pie kids like Cole and I.”
Buttigieg also reacted to Vance’s comments on CNN Tuesday night, telling anchor Kaitlin Collins that Vance shouldn’t comment on other people’s children.
“The really sad thing is he said that after Chasten and I had been through a fairly heartbreaking setback in our adoption journey,” Buttigieg said. “He couldn’t have known that, but maybe that’s why you shouldn’t be talking about other people’s children.”
ABC News’ Kelsey Walsh and MaryAlice Parks contributed to this report
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Johnson ramps up attacks on VP Harris during visit to southern border in California
(SAN DIEGO) — During a visit to the southern border shared with California and Mexico on Thursday, Speaker Mike Johnson ramped up attacks on the Vice President Kamala Harris, calling her a “San Francisco radical” who “bears responsibility for this disaster” as “border czar.”
The visit included a press conference along a border fence called “Whiskey 8” in San Ysidro, California — south of San Diego — with California Republican Rep. Darrell Issa as well as a tour of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection facilities at the San Ysidro Port of Entry and Imperial Beach locations, Johnson’s office told ABC News.
“We’ve had a very interesting tour here at the San Diego sector. This has become in many ways the epicenter of the Biden-Harris border catastrophe. And now we’re very concerned in Congress that this illegal immigrant invasion is threatening even the integrity of our elections,” Johnson said at a press conference held along a border fence.
Johnson claimed the situation in San Diego has worsened.
In recent weeks, San Diego has had the highest number of encounters of any border region in the U.S., according to a senior CBP official. But those numbers have declined by 60 percent since the new asylum restrictions from the Biden administration were put in place earlier this summer.
“[Biden’s] executive order was too weak, too little too late, and it’s not solving the problem,” Johnson said Thursday.
Johnson said human trafficking and illegal narcotics are concerns at the border, specifically in San Diego.
Johnson’s visit came hours after the House approved a resolution to condemn Harris’ border policies. Six Democrats in vulnerable House races — Reps. Mary Peltola, Don Davis, Henry Cuellar, Yadira Caraveo, Gluesenkamp Perez and Jared Golden — voted with Republicans to pass the measure.
Ahead of the vote, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries called the resolution “fake and fraudulent” during his weekly press conference.
“[Kamala Harris] was never assigned border czar. [Republicans] are making that up,” Jeffries said.
Johnson last visited the border in January 2024 when the speaker led a delegation of 64 Republicans to tour the Eagle Pass, Texas, port of entry.
The House has passed its own border bill called the Secure the Border Act, but rejected the bipartisan Senate border bill after Trump pressured Republicans to kill the deal.
ABC News’ Quinn Owen contributed to this report.
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A woman who took an abortion pill was charged with murder. She is now suing prosecutors
(AUSTIN, Texas.) — A Texas woman who self-managed her abortion is suing prosecutors and a local sheriff after she was held in jail for two nights on a murder charge that was ultimately dismissed.
Lizelle Gonzalez, a Star County, Texas, resident, filed a civil rights complaint alleging that hospital staff provided her private information to prosecutors and the county sheriff who later charged her with murder, according to court documents.
Under Texas’ multiple abortion bans, it is not a crime for a woman to obtain or seek abortion care for herself; the abortion bans target physicians and anyone who aids a woman in obtaining or seeking an abortion.
Gonzalez is alleging the prosecutors and the sheriff violated her Fourth and Fourteenth Amendment rights and is seeking over $1 million in damages. Two prosecutors — District Attorney Gocha Allen Ramirez and District Attorney Alexandria Lynn Barrera — as well as Starr County Sheriff Rene Fuentes and Starr County are all named in the lawsuit.
State law prohibits physicians from providing abortion care and places civil and criminal penalties on anyone who aids a woman in obtaining abortion care unless the mother’s life is at risk.
Complaint alleges privacy law violations
Gonzalez says she went to an emergency room in January 2022 after having taken “Cytotec Icetrogen 400 mcg” — otherwise known as misoprotol, one of the two medications used in the abortion pill regimen — to cause an abortion when she was 19 weeks pregnant, according to her complaint.
An exam found no contractions and found a fetal heart rate so she was discharged from the hospital and told to follow up days later, according to her lawsuit.
Less than an hour after she was discharged, she was taken back to the hospital with complaints of abdominal pain and vaginal bleeding. No fetal cardiac activity was detected upon examination and a cesarean section was performed. She delivered a stillborn child, according to court documents.
Gonzalez alleged her private medical information was then given to state prosecutors and the sheriff, ultimately leading to her arrest which she says violated federal privacy laws.
Gonzalez alleged in court documents that the district attorney’s office and the Starr County Sheriff’s Office had agreements with a local hospital to report these types of cases. Gonzalez also alleged there are other women who’s health information was also shared for the purpose of investigations and potential indictments.
She alleged that two district attorneys and the Starr County’s sheriff presented false and misleading information to a grand jury to secure an indictment against her, according to court documents.
Gonzalez was arrested in April 2022 and held in jail for two nights before a $500,000 bond was posted and she was released. The charges against her were dismissed two days after she was released.
Due to her indictment and arrest, Gonzalez suffered “humiliation” which has “permanently affected her standing in the community,” she alleged in court documents.
Earlier this year, Ramirez agreed to pay a $1,250 fine under a settlement reached with the State Bar of Texas and to have his license held in a probated suspension for 12 months for his prosecution of acts clearly not criminal under state law. He remains the Starr County district attorney.
Ramirez and Barrera have sought to have the suit dismissed and have argued in court documents that they have “absolute immunity for the individual claims against them because the pleaded facts show nothing other than actions taken as part of the judicial phase of criminal proceedings,” according to court documents.
Fuentes also sought to get the case thrown out and argued that he has “qualified immunity” and argued that she did not specify claims against him specifically, but rather against his office.
An attorney representing Ramirez, Barrera, Fuentes and Starr County declined to comment on the lawsuit and told ABC News all responses will be through court filings.
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Kamala Harris to take over for Biden after support from Pelosi, Obama
(WASHINGTON) — Vice President Kamala Harris’ emergence as the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination is a historic moment for the United States, as she seems poised to become the first Black woman and Asian American to lead a major party ticket.
The 2024 general election will be the first since 1976 that does not include someone named Bush, Clinton or Biden on the ticket.
Harris quickly garnered support from influential Democrats and raised a record $81 million within 24 hours of President Joe Biden’s withdrawal from the presidential race. From Sunday to Tuesday evening, Team Harris raised $126 million since the endorsement.
She is preparing for her most significant moment yet, as she hits the ground running and makes the case for why voters should elect her the next president.
Her story began in the San Francisco Bay Area. She was a first-generation American, born to an Indian mother and a Jamaican father who divorced when she was 6 years old.
She attended law school at UC Law San Francisco. She worked her way up the political chain, first as deputy district attorney in Oakland in the 1990s, prosecuting gang violence, drug trafficking and sexual abuse cases. In 2004, she became the first woman to serve as the district attorney in San Francisco. She later became California’s first female and person of color to be elected as attorney general before joining the U.S. Senate in 2017.
Harris gained recognition for her work on the judicial and intelligence committees. She held a strong stance on civil rights and abortion rights, which she questioned future Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh about during his nomination hearing.
Harris ran for president in 2019. Although she was not elected as the Democratic nominee. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard in debating Harris in 2019 criticized her, for example, saying there’s no excuse for her record as a prosecutor and she owed an apology to those who suffered under her reign.
Harris oversaw more than 1,900 marijuana convictions in San Francisco, according to previously unreported records, which became a point of criticism. Her critics pointed to her prosecutors appearing to convict people on marijuana charges at a higher rate than her predecessor, based on city data.
After she dropped out of the race in 2019, Biden chose her as his running mate.
Five years later, she now has the opportunity to become president of the United States.
“My biggest thing is making sure that Trump doesn’t get in the White House,” David Brown, a Democratic voter, said in an AP interview. “But I would want to know what her policies are, that’s the big thing for me.”
Harris has secured commitments from enough delegates to become the presumptive nominee if they all honor their commitment when voting, according to ABC News reporting.
And now speculation is turning to who her running mate would be – with prominent figures in battleground states rising to the top, such as Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro.
“Harris’ team, they’re already talking about picking someone from a potential swing state, somebody who hails from one of these critical states that Harris would need to win the presidency,” said Rachael Bade, a Politico reporter and an ABC News contributor. “They’re trying to figure out a way that she can extend her reach beyond her typical base.”
Other potential running mates for Harris are Governors Andy Beshear of Kentucky, Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan and Roy Cooper of North Carolina.
Though a source familiar tells ABC News’ Mary Bruce the pool is roughly 12 people being considered for Harris’ running mate. Harris is expected to make her announcement by Aug. 7.
Without wasting any time, Harris’ team is launching their first campaign ad hammering Republicans over their anti-abortion rights position.
As Harris steps into the spotlight, she will face criticisms of her past — from Republicans over issues like immigration and Democrats wary of her time as a prosecutor.
Biden had tasked Harris with leading diplomatic efforts in 2021 to address the root causes of migration in three Central American countries. The White House has praised her work, but Republicans have strongly criticized her on the immigration issue.
During her first overseas trip as vice president, she advised Guatemalan migrants not to come to the U.S., which drew criticism from immigration advocates.
With the Democratic convention just weeks away in Chicago, Republicans are taking aim at the likely nominee. Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance made his first solo campaign appearance Monday and attacked Harris.
“If you want to lead this country, you should feel grateful for it,” Vance said. “You should feel a sense of gratitude and I never hear that gratitude come through when I listen to Kamala Harris.”
Vance took another jab at Harris and the Democratic Party at his rally in Virginia Monday evening.
“A couple of elite Democrats got a smoke-filled room and decided to throw Joe Biden overboard,” Vance said. “That is not how it works. That is a threat to democracy.”
Trump has expressed frustration over restarting his campaign now that Biden has exited the race. While Republicans and the Trump campaign used Biden’s age as a problem, with Biden out of the race Trump is now the oldest presidential nominee in history.
Trump himself was once a supporter of Harris. He donated $6,000 to her campaign for reelection as California attorney general, including a $5,000 check.
Both campaigns are gearing up for a fight with only three months left before voters go to the polls.
“We have doors to knock on, we have people to talk to, we have phone calls to make, and we have an election to win,” Harris said Monday in Wilmington, Delaware.
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