Biden signs proclamation establishing Springfield 1908 Race Riot Monument
(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden on Friday signed a proclamation establishing the Springfield 1908 Race Riot Monument, located on the site of a deadly attack on a Black community by a white mob 116 years ago.
By establishing the monument, the White House said in a statement, the president is “recognizing the significance of these events and the broader history of Black community resilience in the face of violent oppression.”
Biden was joined by civil rights leaders, community members and elected officials in the Oval Office.
“What I’m excited about, beyond the specifics of this, we’re rewriting history,” Biden said. “So our children, our grandchildren – everybody understands what happened, and what can still happen.”
Just before signing the proclamation, he explained how “a mob not far from Lincoln’s home unleashed a race riot in Springfield.”
Illinois Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin elaborated on what he called the “national significance” of the attack’s ties to Abraham Lincoln.
“It was the connection with Lincoln that really drove home the point that racism has to end in America,” he said at the signing ceremony. “And we’re still fighting that battle now.”
The monument will protect 1.57 acres of federal land in Springfield, Illinois, and will include the foundations of five houses that were destroyed in the violence.
“I know this may not seem significant to you, to most Americans, but it’s important. It’s important, important, important,” Biden said.
The White House added that this incident was representative of the “racism, intimidation, and violence that Black Americans experienced across the country.”
Biden emphasized the need for generations of Americans to understand such history. “As a matter of fact something happened here similar, recently,” he said.
He also noted how the horrific attack “sparked the creation of the NAACP,” which he views as “one of the most important organizations” in America.
“I’m so proud that Springfield, Illinois, is home to the beginning of the NAACP,” Illinois Democratic Sen. Tammy Duckworth added. “Good things can come out of bad things, as long as you don’t forget what happened.”
Lawmakers have been calling on Biden to use his authority under the Antiquities Act to designate the site as a national monument.
Although legislation had been introduced seeking to advance this goal, Duckworth explained how “it’s been stuck in the House.”
As a result, they believed executive action was the “best chance to protect this area and mark this part of our history.”
This effort marks the eighth addition to the national park system during the Biden-Harris administration.
(WASHINGTON) — At least 38 members of Congress signed a letter sent Monday to the president of the Heritage Foundation requesting he meet with lawmakers to discuss Project 2025 and release the undisclosed fourth pillar of the project called the “180-Day Playbook.”
“Our offices are increasingly hearing from constituents worried about the impact of Project 2025 on the future of our nation,” read the letter obtained exclusively by ABC News.
“A growing number of Americans are concerned that Project 2025, which you describe as ‘a second American revolution,’ poses an unprecedented threat to our democracy, reproductive freedoms, public education, LGBTQIA+ rights, our economy, environment, public health and more,” it said.
Project 2025, a 922-page playbook of controversial policy proposals intended to guide the next conservative administration, has continued to garner attention as the presidential election campaigns of Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump heat up.
It includes plans to expand presidential power, eliminate the Department of Education and Department of Homeland Security, privatizing other federal agencies, taking the abortion pill mifepristone off the market, restricting insurance coverage mandates, cutting federal funding for clean energy research, restricting welfare programs and more.
This letter comes as Democrats try to paint Project 2025 as a warning of what is to come under a second Trump term. However, Trump has tried to distance himself from the policy proposals.
“They are extreme, seriously extreme,” said Trump in a July 20 rally. “I don’t know anything about it. I don’t want to know anything about it.”
While Trump has said that he doesn’t know anything about Project 2025, dozens of the former president’s current and former advisers and appointees have authored or have been connected to the project, including former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson and former Acting Secretary of Defense and Special Assistant Christopher Miller.
Project 2025 officials previously told ABC News that it does “not speak for any candidate or campaign.”
However, Trump’s official campaign plan called Agenda47 aligns with several proposals in Project 2025.
Its unpublished so-called fourth pillar, the “180-Day Playbook,” is described on the Project 2025 website as “a playbook of actions to be taken in the first 180 days of the new administration to bring quick relief to Americans suffering from the Left’s devastating policies.”
“Project 2025’s policy book is nothing new,” the Project 2025 website reads. “Mandate for Leadership has been published regularly since the 1980s. In it, respected conservative authors espouse conservative policy ideas for incoming administrations to consider. Progressive organizations do the same thing.”
The letter cites concerns over potential executive orders, emergency declarations, presidential directives, and other measures that could be implemented under the “180-Day Playbook,” which is not published on the project’s website.
The letter to the Heritage Foundation president, Kevin Roberts, predicts that the playbook contains the “most radical, extreme and dangerous parts of Project 2025.”
It continued, “If we are wrong about that – if your secret ‘Fourth Pillar’ of Project 2025 is actually a defensible, responsible and constitutional action plan for the first days of a second Trump presidency — then we hope you will publish it, without edits or redaction. Allow the American people to see it and scrutinize it.”
ABC News has reached out to the Heritage Foundation for comment concerning the controversy and the letter from members of Congress.
“We believe it is overwhelmingly in the public interest for you to actually keep your ‘open book’ promise by disclosing the ‘Fourth Pillar’ of Project 2025, and we hope you’ll consider explaining why, unlike the first three pillars, you have been keeping it secret for so long,” the letter reads.
The letter campaign was led by Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley, D-Mass., and Congressman Jared Huffman, D-Calif., who founded a congressional task force aimed at putting an end to the hopes laid out in Project 2025.
The letter was also signed by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., Cori Bush, D-Mo., and others. No Republican lawmakers signed the letter.
It asks Roberts to respond to the request for a meeting, in which no official congressional power is being used to compel his presence, by Friday, Aug. 16.
The Heritage Project and Project 2025 saw a leadership change in July when Project 2025’s director Paul Dans stepped down amid intense scrutiny of the conservative blueprint.
Roberts said at the time that the move was based on the timeline for the drafting of the project, which concluded after the two party conventions.
(WASHINGTON) — Vice President Kamala Harris is expected to soon face her first post-convention test when she sits for a formal interview airing in primetime Thursday.
CNN announced Tuesday that Harris and her running mate Gov. Tim Walz will be interviewed by anchor Dana Bash, marking the first sitdown with a reporter since President Joe Biden bowed out of the race.
The announcement came as Harris faced growing calls from critics about her availability to reporters since she took over the campaign.
Ian Sams, a senior adviser to the Harris campaign, appeared reiterated on Monday that Harris would “schedule” a sit-down interview by the end of the month.
The initial absence of plans for any such sit-down prompted accusations by Republican critics of dodging the press.
“She refuses to do any interviews or press conferences, almost 30 days now, she has not done an interview,” former President Donald Trump said of Harris at a North Carolina event earlier this month. “You know why she hasn’t done an interview? Because she’s not smart. She’s not intelligent.”
His campaign has said Harris is trying to “duck and hide” from the news media, which is sure to sling several tough questions her way when she meets the press.
The lack of a media interview has yet to hurt Harris, whose poll numbers are outpacing those of President Joe Biden when he was atop the Democratic ticket, according to 538’s national polling average. As of Tuesday, Harris is polling ahead of Trump, 47.2% to 43.6%; when Biden left the race, he was polling at 40.2% compared to Trump’s 43.5%, according to 538’s polling average.
Harris has also stirred enthusiasm from Democrats that had been absent most of the campaign cycle — and is riding a high following last week’s Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
Moreover, she chose a running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, whose rural background has helped the ticket craft a message Democrats have said they believe will make inroads with voters in conservative parts of the country.
All the while, Trump has seemed to abandon the discipline Republicans had lauded him for this summer. Recently, he has made false claims about the crowd size at a Harris rally and appeared to forget to mention a policy proposal he had been slated to unveil at an event in Michigan.
Democrats have cautioned that Harris has several hurdles to clear in the coming weeks.
One of those hurdles is the pending media interview, where Harris would likely have to defend the decisions of the Biden administration and specify some of her policy stances.
On Monday, Trump sought to spotlight Harris’ connection to the Biden administration’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan, laying wreaths in Arlington National Cemetery to commemorate the third anniversary of the suicide bombing that killed 13 U.S. service members.
“Caused by Kamala Harris, Joe Biden, the humiliation in Afghanistan set off the collapse of American credibility and respect all around the world,” Trump claimed when he spoke to National Guardsmen at a Detroit event later Monday.
Harris is also likely to be pressed on how much she knew about Biden’s capacities prior to the June 27 debate. That night, she urged Americans to judge Biden not on the “90 minutes” on stage but the “three-and-a-half years of performance.”
Yet, that same debate performance set in motion a weekslong effort by top Democrats to nudge Biden from the race.
Few had a better understanding of what Biden was like behind the scenes than Harris, his No. 2, and an interviewer would likely challenge her about what she witnessed in private.
Harris would surely be asked about the war in Gaza. She said recently, “We need a cease-fire,” but is a member of an administration that has yet to help broker one.
The situation at the southern border would likely be another topic an interviewer would press Harris on. Republicans have linked her to an increase in unauthorized border crossings earlier in Biden’s term, misleadingly dubbing her the “border czar.”
An interviewer might also ask Harris to respond to the criticism of her recently unveiled economic plan, in which she called for an end to grocery “price-gouging,” prompting accusations by some Republicans that she wants “communist price controls.”
Harris travels this week to south Georgia, where she will embark on a bus tour and hold a rally in Savannah, Georgia.
(PHILADELPHIA) — Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump square off Tuesday at what could be their only presidential debate, setting high stakes for an event expected to be viewed by millions of Americans and a key sliver of undecided voters.
Harris’ momentum — after her unusual rise as the Democrats’ nominee shot her into a neck-and-neck race — has now stalled, making the head-to-head matchup an opportunity to get that started again if she can adequately make the argument for her own candidacy and cast Trump as unfit for another term.
Trump, meanwhile, has struggled to find a way to consistently and effectively attack his new opponent but has remained highly competitive, thanks to a large base of immovable supporters and the broad swath of Americans who already have fixed views of him. Tuesday’s debate offers him an opportunity to solidify his support while painting Harris in a negative light to an electorate that has less cemented perceptions of her.
The ABC News debate, moderated by David Muir and Linsey Davis, will take place on Tuesday, Sept. 10 at 9 p.m ET. A prime-time pre-debate special will air at 8 p.m. ET. It will air on ABC and stream on ABC News Live, Disney+ and Hulu. Viewers can also stream the debate on the ABC app on a smartphone or tablet, on ABC.com and connected devices.
Here are five things to watch at Tuesday’s debate:
Can Trump stay focused on policy?
Trump has worked to peg Harris as a “California liberal,” letting voters’ perceptions of the progressive bastion paint a picture of a candidate who served as the state’s attorney general and junior senator. He’s also hammered her on immigration and inflation — two voter concerns on which polls suggest he has an edge.
However, he’s also veered into personal remarks, including falsely questioning Harris’ racial identity (she’s Black and south Asian), touting what he says are his superior good looks and promoting vulgar and false allegations that past romantic relationships of Harris’ helped propel her political career.
Staying on message on his four-year economic record, which saw low inflation before the pandemic and less fervor over unauthorized border crossings, is key, allies told ABC News.
Veering into personal attacks would be counterproductive, they argued, drawing media attention away from what they view as a favorable policy issue set.
“I think he does,” former White House press secretary Sean Spicer said when asked if Trump makes an effective contrast on the trail. “If I had a critique, it would be that he’ll make the case sometimes and then, with all due respect, he will sometimes go beyond the case and give the media something else to focus on.”
“He needs to avoid creating a moment that takes the focus away from her record. So, if it’s about her personality or her appearance as opposed to her record, that will change the focus of what people talk about the next day,” Spicer said.
How does Harris introduce herself to undecided voters?
While Trump comes in with nearly universal name recognition, 28% of likely voters in a recent New York Times/Siena College poll said they feel they “need to learn more about Kamala Harris.” That means that while many voters have heard of Harris, she is less defined than Trump in their eyes and thus has more work to do to introduce herself — lest she be defined by her opposition.
Harris has dual goals in Tuesday’s debate: make the case for herself as someone who would be a capable president and get under Trump’s skin to spark a reaction to suggest he isn’t worthy of another four years in the White House.
“I think there needs to be a long litany of just pummeling Donald Trump while also being extremely clear about what your vision is for the future,” said Bakari Sellers, a prominent Harris ally and Democratic media commentator.
Harris on the trail has sought to do both.
Monday, she fleshed out her policy proposals in a new page on her website, her most expansive explanation yet of her platform. And in early stump speeches, she boasted of her time working as a prosecutor and state attorney general combating gangs and other criminal activity, saying to crowds that she knows “Donald Trump’s type,” in a clear reference to his legal travails.
The way she balances those two dictates could offer clues as to the way she and her campaign best think she can march to victory in November.
Will there be any hot mics?
Harris had a memorable debate performance in 2020, when she faced off against then-Vice President Mike Pence. Pence was muscling in on her answers, allowing her to declare, “I’m speaking,” in one of the more viral instances of the night.
It’s unclear whether she’ll be able to replicate such a moment.
The candidates’ microphones will be muted while their opponent is answering a question, something Harris’ team argued against in the hopes of tempting Trump to aggressively interrupt her and come off as unpresidential.
In an election in which policy is largely taking a backseat to personality, producing such a clash might possibly spark one of the debate’s most notable moments.
How big of a role will President Joe Biden play?
Harris has been walking a tightrope since the start of her campaign between recognizing her role in Biden’s administration and touting its achievements while also casting herself as a candidate in her own right, particularly after the unusual way in which she became her party’s nominee.
A recent New York Times/Siena College poll showed that roughly 61% of likely voters said the next president should represent a major change from Biden. Only 25% of them said Harris represented that change, compared to 53% who said Trump did.
Harris so far has appeared mostly on the campaign trail by herself, and in a joint appearance in Pittsburgh and at Democrats’ convention last month, Biden spoke first before handing the stage off to Harris, underscoring her role in the electoral spotlight.
Trump, meanwhile, has at times focused extensively on Biden, particularly in the days and weeks after the president ended his campaign and handed the reins to Harris.
Such a strategy risks focusing too much on Biden rather than Trump’s own opponent — but, allies said, tying Harris to voter disapproval of the way the current president has handled the economy and inflation could be a boon.
“For him to be viewed as having a successful debate, he has to continue that assault,” said one former campaign aide in touch with Trump’s current team. “She’s the vice president United States seeking the second term of Joe Biden. We can make that case.”
Is there a major moment that moves the electoral needle?
The last debate between Biden and Trump was clearly consequential — it ended the former’s campaign. That doesn’t mean Tuesday’s debate will pack the same punch.
Surely, millions will tune in to the latest salvo in a race packed with unpredictable twists and turns, raising the stakes. But many debates make little more than ripples in presidential races — an outcome that might benefit neither candidate.
As it stands, it’s a neck-and-neck race. Harris would like a moment that revives her momentum, which jolted her into contention but now is stalled; Trump would like a moment to erase some of the gains Harris has made and actually reverse her improved poll numbers.