Harris, Walz emphasize 'freedom,' 'joy' and press attacks on Trump, Vance in raucous first rally

Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris introduced running mate Tim Walz at a rally Tuesday evening in Philadelphia, where the Democratic duo pledged to restore freedom and hope they contend would be stripped away if former President Trump wins a second term in the White House.

The Minnesota governor, little known nationally before his selection Tuesday as Harris’ No. 2, told a raucous partisan audience that he is the product of small-town America, who believes in old-fashioned values.

“I was born in West Point, Neb., and lived in Butte, a small town of 400 where community was a way of life,” said Walz, 60. “Growing up, I spent summers working on the family farm. My mom and dad taught us to show generosity toward your neighbors and to work for the common good.”

Walz said communal strength loomed large in Minnesota, the state where he has governed since 2019 and that he planned to bring that culture to the White House.

“Minnesota’s strength comes from our values,” Walz said, “our commitment to working together, to seeing past our differences, to lending a helping hand. “

In introducing Walz, Harris pictured her running mate as the kind, common sense alternative to Republican policies that she said had stripped away fundamental rights.

“We fight for a future where we defend our most fundamental freedoms,” Harris said. “We fight freedom to vote, freedom to be safe from gun violence, freedom to love who you love openly and with pride, and the freedom of a woman to make decisions about her own body, not having the government tell her what to do.”

Democrats have been buoyed by Harris’ entry into the race two weeks ago, after President Biden’s withdrawal. Polls have shown a narrowing of an already tight race. The candidate’s campaign reported that she had collected more than $300 million in campaign donations, with a spokesperson saying an additional $20 million poured in after Harris announced on social media Tuesday morning that Walz would join her on the ticket.

The Democratic duo plans to visit battleground states in the Midwest, before flying west to campaign in Arizona and Nevada. Those states are expected to hold the key to victory in the election along with the swing states of Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan and Georgia.

Harris, 59, whipped through the resume of her new political partner, depicting him as an everyman who understood the travails of regular Americans. She described his youth on a family farm in Nebraska, his two decades as a high school social studies teacher and work as an assistant coach for a state champion high school football team.

She noted that Walz simultaneously coached linebackers on the West Mankato High School football team and supported students who wanted to start a gay-straight alliance.

“At a time when acceptance was difficult to find for LGBTQ students, Tim knew the signal that it would send to have a football coach get involved,” Harris said. “So he signed up to be the group’s faculty adviser. Students have said he made the school a safe place for everybody.”

It was that supportive stance that led to students voting Walz as the most inspirational faculty member, Harris said.

“We both believe in lifting people up, not knocking them down,” Harris said. “When we look at folks, our fellow Americans, we see neighbors not enemies.”

Walz said more than once that Harris had brought “joy” back to America’s public arena, but the folksy politician showed he also wasn’t above throwing a punch.

He chided his vice presidential rival, noting that Republican JD Vance’s rural roots grew into a much different life than one he recognized from Middle America.

“Like all regular people I grew up with in the heartland, JD studied at Yale, had his career funded by Silicon Valley billionaires and then wrote a bestseller trashing that community,” Walz said, before throwing his arms wide and chiding: “Come on! That’s not what Middle-America is.”

Walz drew knowing laughter from the crowd at the Liacouras Center arena at Temple University when he reprised one of his first attacks on the Republican ticket, saying Trump and Vance “are creepy and, yes, just weird as hell.”

He found another punchline in the multiple criminal cases against Trump, saying of the former president: “He froze in the face of the COVID crisis. He drove our economy into the ground and make no mistake, violent crime was up under Donald Trump.” After a round of applause, Walz added: “That’s not even counting the crimes he committed.”

Saying he welcomed a chance to debate Vance, Walz then made a thinly veiled reference to a prurient, and unfounded, rumor about Vance’s purported fixation with living room furniture.

“I can’t wait to debate the guy — if he’s willing to get off the couch and show up!” Walz said.

Harris and Walz both suggested that a second Trump term would strike a crippling blow against progressive government programs. They said he would try to gut the Affordable Care Act, the law that brought health care coverage to millions of Americans; “gut” Social Security and Medicare; .and continue to crack down on abortion, a procedure that became much harder to obtain after Trump-appointed Supreme Court justices helped reverse the Roe v. Wade decision.

“Today in America, one out of three women live in a state with a Trump abortion ban,” Harris said. “Some of those bans go back to 1800s, before women had a right to vote. We have a message for Trump and those who want to turn back our freedoms: We’re not going back!”

That led to a prolonged chant from the crowd: “Not going back!”