WASHIGTON - Kamala Harris is responding to Democratic panic about her White House prospects by turning up the heat on Donald Trump. The vice president warned Tuesday that the ex-president was “unstable,” “unhinged” and out for “unchecked power” as she sent a jolt of urgency though her campaign with 21 days to go.
“Watch his rallies. Listen to his words. He tells us who he is, and he tells us what he would do if he is elected president,” Harris told a large crowd in Pennsylvania after a weekend when Trump’s authoritarian rhetoric reached chilling new levels and hinted at the extreme nature of his potential second term. Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz, meanwhile, went even further, suggesting the ex-president’s musings about using the military against domestic foes he branded “the enemy from within” could even amount to treason. Harris and her team also aggressively questioned Trump’s mental fitness and his capacity to serve another term, turning the tables on the Republican nominee who for months leveled similar charges at President Joe Biden.
In another effort by Harris to ease concerns about her apparently stalled momentum, she announced a major new initiative to court Black male voters amid anxiety that Trump is making inroads into a critical Democratic support base or that they simply won’t turn out.
And in a new ad campaign in swing state Arizona, Harris made fresh attempts to win over Republicans alienated by the ex-president’s behavior but who have yet to make what is for many a wrenching decision to cross party lines. To that end, Harris also announced that she’d sit down for her first formal interview with Fox News, dropping her earlier reticence over unscripted events to create a contrast with Trump, who rarely leaves the conservative media bubble. Harris’ new efforts to dictate the pace of the election’s endgame came as both candidates campaigned in opposite corners of Pennsylvania. The commonwealth’s 19 electoral votes could well decide who wins the White House and, like a handful of other battlegrounds, it’s a toss-up according to latest polls.
Harris is entering the decisive stretch of her political life. Her actions under the most intense pressure in the next three weeks will be watched by remaining voters who’ve yet to make up their minds and may be looking for a reason to pick her. She needs to also energize wavering or unenthusiastic Democratic-leaning voters who may not show up on Election Day.
More broadly, the vice president faces one of the most daunting political assignments in decades, after taking over from Biden as the Democratic candidate months before the election. She’s trying to convince a disgruntled electorate that she’s a change candidate despite being part of an unpopular administration, while trying to take down Trump, who has shown there is almost nothing he won’t do to win back power.
Yet Harris’ efforts to close the deal against the former president are being complicated by his refusal to meet her for a second debate after her strong performance in their first showdown in September gave her campaign a boost.