Kamala Harris to deliver closing argument at site of Trump’s pre-insurrection rally

WASHINGTON — Vice President Kamala Harris plans to deliver what advisors are calling a closing message Tuesday night, a week before election day, speaking from the same spot on the National Mall where former President Donald Trump spoke before his allies cited his false election claims as they stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

The speech’s location underscores the Harris campaign’s belief that it has to remind voters that Trump has vowed to undertake a number of anti-democratic actions if he regains the presidency, including punishing “the enemy from within “ using the courts and the military.

Yet a campaign official, who requested anonymity to discuss sensitive campaign planning, said the speech would also be an optimistic call to put country over party, part of Harris’ effort to win over a small sliver of conservatives who are wary of Trump’s Republican Party takeover.

The Harris campaign was hopeful that Trump’s closing speech, delivered Sunday at Madison Square Garden in New York, would remind voters who had tuned him out about the divisive nature of his presidency. The speakers called Harris “the anti-Christ,” referred to “her pimp handlers” and called Puerto Rico “a floating island of garbage” while Trump unleashed a string of dark language depicting the country as “occupied” by migrants.

The campaign and other Republicans have disavowed the remarks about Puerto Ricans during a comedy routine by Tony Hinchcliffe, but not the other remarks, including Hinchcliffe’s insults of Latinos, Palestinians, Jews and Black people.

The location of Harris’ speech, with the White House behind her, is also intended to contrast her vision as a president with a “to-do” list based on lowering prices and middle-class proposals with Trump’s focus on himself and his long list of grievances, the campaign official said.

The campaign believes Americans are tired of the Trump era and pointed to polling showing Americans view Harris as more concerned with “people like you.”

“People are exhausted with him,” Harris said Monday.

Polling shows the race is a dead heat, both in the popular vote and among the seven swing states that will likely decide the winner: Arizona, Nevada, Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Georgia. The two candidates and their top allies are blanketing those states and spending more than $1 billion on ads, largely aimed at winning over the final slice of persuadable voters who make up about 5% of the electorate.