Harris casts Trump as chaotic, divisive in speech at Jan. 6 site

Harris made the case that she ultimately is an avatar for the notion of freedom

Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris argued a second Donald Trump presidency would be steeped in chaos and division - but not focused on Americans' needs - as she looked to rally voters from the National Mall one week before Election Day.

The vice president sought to balance her closing argument between a dire admonition to rally against an opponent she's labeled a fascist threat and an affirmative case for her own policy and economic agenda. The event's location - the same spot where Republican nominee Trump rallied supporters on Jan. 6, 2021, and within eyeshot of the Oval Office - was intended both to evoke the mayhem of that day and the gravity of the election's results.

"This election is more than just a choice between two parties and two different candidates. It is a choice about whether we have a country rooted in freedom for every American or ruled by chaos and division," Harris said.

The major challenge for the vice president has been streamlining and consolidating her often scattershot argument to voters who have spent a decade hearing about the dangers Trump poses, even as new outrages - including racist remarks made by speakers at his Madison Square Garden rally on Sunday - continue to roil US politics.

That mission is made all the more difficult thanks to the pinch of post-pandemic inflation and the low political standing of President Joe Biden after concerns over his acuity forced him to end his reelection bid.

"Our top priority as a nation four years ago was to end the pandemic and rescue the economy. Now our biggest challenge is to lower costs, costs that were rising even before the pandemic and that are still too high," Harris said. "I get it."

On Tuesday night, Harris made the case that she ultimately is an avatar for the notion of freedom - a term she broadly defines to encompass economic mobility, reproductive rights, and protection from Trump's vowed retribution were he returned to the White House.

The venue also allowed Harris to draw a massive crowd of over 75,000 supporters, according to her campaign, in a show of strength that needled her Republican opponent. Trump, who began speaking in Pennsylvania moments after Harris took the stage in Washington, claimed - without evidence - that her campaign bussed in actors to stand in the crowd.

"They're busing people," Trump said to the partially-full 10,000-person capacity PPL Center in Allentown. "You know, they're in a place in Washington, and they're busing people because they couldn't get anybody to show up for tonight. I didn't bus anybody. You're all here."

Economic platform

Harris' remarks may take outsized importance in a race that polls show balancing on a knife's edge, and with a critical bloc of undecided voters saying they want to learn more about the vice president.

Harris looked to address that curiosity by outlining her economic platform, which offers tax breaks and federal subsidies to new parents, first-time homebuyers, and those starting new businesses. She sought to shore up concern over inflation by pledging to prosecute price gougers.

"I am not afraid of tough fights against bad actors and powerful interests," Harris said.

Brian Deese, a Harris campaign adviser, said it made sense for the economy to be at the center of the vice president's speech because she believes Trump poses linked risks to the economy and democracy.

"If you have somebody who doesn't respect the rule of law and property rights, doesn't respect the independence of the Fed, doesn't respect the institutions that businesses and capital providers in the US have relied on for decades, if not centuries, in the US economy, the consequences for business investment, for economic growth, will be profound," Deese said.

Trump has suggested that if elected he would seek greater influence over the Federal Reserve, saying he thinks presidents should have more sway over the central bank's decisions on interest rates.

'Unstable'

Still, Harris' harshest words of the night were saved for Trump, who she cast as "unstable, obsessed with revenge, consumed with grievance, and out for unchecked power."

Harris did not directly mention the controversy surrounding Trump's New York event, including a comedian's description of Puerto Rico as a "floating island of garbage." But she broadly condemned his brand of politics repeatedly throughout her remarks.

"Donald Trump has spent a decade trying to keep the American people divided and afraid of each other," she said. "That's who he is. But America, I am here tonight to say: that's not who we are."

The flap is dangerous to the former president both in that it could mobilize Puerto Rican voters "- a sizable voting bloc in the key battleground of Pennsylvania "- and, more broadly, focus attention on Trump's penchant for courting allies who espouse racist views and voice conspiracy theories.

Trump, meanwhile, throughout the day aimed to by turns move past the Madison Square Garden rally and counterprogram Harris.

The former president held an event at his Mar-a-Lago estate where he focused on immigration, an issue that polls better for him than Harris. He taped an interview with Fox News commentator Sean Hannity set to air Tuesday night. And in Allentown, he lauded his Saturday event, calling it the "greatest evening anybody's ever seen politically."

Democrats have been torn over the past few weeks over how much Harris should call out Trump's inflammatory comments - or the raft of former Trump White House officials who no longer support him - versus the time Harris should spend speaking about her own vision. In addition to the Madison Square Garden incident, Trump's former White House chief of staff, John Kelly, said the Republican nominee had made comments about wanting military leaders similar to those in Nazi Germany.

"This is a moment to shift that balance," said Karen Finney, a long-time Democratic strategist and Harris ally. "The comments about Kelly were astonishing but needed to be underscored, but this speech revives the opportunity to remind voters that it's about all of us, the American people."

Confident campaign

Behind the scenes, Harris officials have expressed more confidence about her chances of winning Pennsylvania and Wisconsin while they are less sure about her standing in Michigan. There, a number of Arab-Americans may sit out this election given their disgust with Biden's handling of Israel's war in Gaza. The Trump campaign has been aggressively running attack ads in Michigan in an effort to suppress Harris' Democratic support.

Senior Harris aides said earlier Tuesday they remain optimistic that they are well positioned to emerge victorious in a closely-fought contest.

"We're confident we're going to win. And it's not because we're running away with it. It's because we're confident we're on path to win a very close election," campaign chair Jen O'Malley Dillon said in a conference call on Tuesday.