US Vice President Kamala Harris has made her first public appearance since Joe Biden abruptly abandoned his re-election bid and endorsed her as his successor. Photo: Chris Kleponis / AFP
By Trevor Hunnicutt, Nandita Bose and Jeff Mason, Reuters
US Vice President Kamala Harris won the support of one of America's longest-serving and best-known Democrats - Nancy Pelosi - in her bid to succeed President Joe Biden, who ended his re-election bid.
Pelosi, who remains influential since stepping down as House speaker in 2022, played a leading role in persuading Biden, 81, to end his campaign amid concerns over his acuity and ability to beat Republican Donald Trump or to serve another four years.
"With love and gratitude, I salute President Biden for always believing in the possibilities of America and giving people the opportunity to reach their fulfilment," Pelosi, 84, said in a statement. "We must unify and charge forward to resoundingly defeat Donald Trump and enthusiastically elect Kamala Harris as the next President of the United States."
Virtually all of the prominent Democrats who had been seen as potential challengers to Harris have lined up behind her, including Governors Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, Gavin Newsom of California and Andy Beshear of Kentucky.
Biden's departure was the latest shock to a White House race that included the near-assassination of former President Trump by a gunman during a campaign stop and the nomination of Trump's fellow hardliner, US Senator JD Vance, as his running mate.
Harris, 59, lauded Biden for his service to the country on Monday in her first public appearance since he abruptly abandoned his reelection bid and endorsed her as his successor.
"Joe Biden's legacy over the last three years is unmatched in modern history," Harris said at a White House event to honour college athletes. "Every day, our president, Joe Biden, fights for the American people and we are deeply, deeply grateful for his service to our nation."
Harris did not specifically refer to her new status as the leading Democratic candidate for president, after Biden stepped aside on Sunday under growing pressure from fellow Democrats.
Campaign officials and allies have already made hundreds of calls on Harris' behalf, urging delegates to next month's Democratic Party convention to join in nominating her for president in the 5 November election against Republican Donald Trump.
Harris said in a post on X that she would visit what had been the Biden campaign headquarters in Delaware - now the Harris campaign headquarters - on Monday afternoon. She said Biden, who tested positive for Covid-19 last week, was feeling better.
Virtually all of the prominent Democrats who had been seen as potential challengers to Harris have lined up behind her, including Governors Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, Gavin Newsom of California and Andy Beshear of Kentucky.
"My intention is to earn and win this nomination," Harris said in a statement on Sunday. "I will do everything in my power to unite the Democratic Party and unite our nation to defeat Donald Trump."
Harris, who is Black and Asian American, would fashion an entirely new dynamic with Trump, 78, offering a vivid generational and cultural contrast.
The Trump campaign has been preparing for her possible rise for weeks, sources told Reuters. It sent out a detailed critique of her record on immigration and other issues on Monday, accusing her of being more liberal than Biden.
It alleged that Harris favoured abolishing the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency and decriminalizing border crossings, backed the so-called Green New Deal, supported the administration's electric vehicle mandates and encouraged "defund the police" efforts.
Some of those were positions Harris adopted as an unsuccessful presidential candidate in the 2020 election when she was running on a more liberal agenda than Biden but were not ones that the administration assumed, particularly with regard to border security and law enforcement issues.
Biden, at 81 the oldest person ever to have occupied the Oval Office, said he would remain in the presidency until his term ends on 20 January, 2025.
Biden's shaky June 27 debate performance against Trump led senior Democrats to urge him to end his run, but senior Republicans have demanded he resign from office, arguing that if he is not fit to campaign, he is not fit to govern.
Harris spent Sunday working the phones, dressed in a Howard University sweatshirt and eating pizza with anchovies as she spoke with Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, a potential vice presidential running mate, House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries and Congressional Black Caucus chair Representative Steven Horsford, according to sources.
Trump, whose false claims that his 2020 loss to Biden was the result of fraud inspired the 6 January, 2021, assault on the US Capitol, on Monday questioned Democrats' right to change candidates.
"They stole the race from Biden after he won it in the primaries," Trump said on his Truth Social site.
Despite the early show of support for Harris, talk of an open convention when Democrats gather in Chicago on 19-22 August was not totally silenced.
Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and former President Barack Obama did not announce endorsements, although both praised Biden. In a post on X that did not mention Harris, billionaire Michael Bloomberg, a major Democratic donor, encouraged the party to "take the pulse of voters" before making a decision.
With Democrats wading into uncharted territory, Democratic National Committee Chair Jaime Harrison said the party would soon announce the next steps in its nomination process.
Abortion rights leader
Biden won the party's nomination in 2020, picked Harris to be his vice president, and went on to beat Trump. She is a former California attorney general and a former US senator.
Harris is expected to stick largely to Biden's foreign policy playbook on such issues as China, Iran and Ukraine, but could strike a tougher tone with Israel over the Gaza war if she tops the Democratic ticket and wins the November election.
She has been outspoken on abortion rights, an issue that resonates with younger voters and more liberal Democrats.
Proponents argue she would energize those voters, consolidate Black support and bring sharp debating skills to prosecute the political case against the former president.
But some Democrats were concerned about a Harris candidacy, in part because of the weight of a long history of racial and gender discrimination in the United States, which has not elected a woman president in its nearly 250-year history.
Polling shows that Harris performs no better statistically than Biden had against Trump.
In a head-to-head match-up, Harris and Trump were tied with 44 percent support each in a 15-16 July Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted immediately after the July 13 assassination attempt on Trump.
Trump led Biden 43 percent to 41 percent in that same poll, though the 2 percentage point difference was not meaningful considering the poll's 3-point margin of error.
Biden's campaign had US$95 million on hand at the end of June, according to a filing with the Federal Election Commission. Trump's campaign ended the month with US$128 million. Campaign finance law experts disagree on how easily that money could be shifted to a Harris-led campaign.
Harris' campaign had raised US$49.6 million in less than 24 hours after Biden's exit, a campaign spokesperson said on Monday.
More than 44,000 Black women and allies, including Representatives Maxine Waters, Jasmine Crockett and Joyce Beatty, joined a three-hour call on Sunday evening in support of Harris's bid, raising more than US$1.5 million for her presidential campaign, organizers told Reuters.
Biden has not been seen in public since testing positive for Covid on Wednesday. He was isolating at his home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, and tentatively plans to meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday if he has recovered.
- Reuters