ROMULUS, Mich. — Vice President Kamala Harris declared herself and her new running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, “joyful warriors” against Donald Trump on Wednesday as they spent their first full day campaigning together across the Midwest. They got an unusual glimpse of how hotly contested the region will be when they overlapped on a Wisconsin tarmac with Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance.
The Democrats visited Wisconsin and Michigan, hoping to shore up support among the younger, diverse, labor-friendly voters who were instrumental in helping President Joe Biden win the 2020 election.
Ms. Harris told the day’s first rally in Eau Claire, “As Tim Walz likes to point out, we are joyful warriors.” Contributing to that feeling, the Harris campaign said it had raised $36 million in the first 24 hours after she announced Mr. Walz as her running mate.
The vice president said the pair look on the future with optimism, unlike Trump, the former president and Republican White House nominee, whom she accused of being stuck in the past and preferring a confrontational style of politics — even as she criticized her opponent herself.
“Someone who suggests we should terminate the Constitution of the United States should never again have the chance to sit behind the seal of the United States,” Ms. Harris said, her voice rising.
Dan Miller, from Pelican Lake, Wis., who was among 12,000-plus Eau Claire rally attendees, said Mr. Biden “has been an incredible president, but he just isn’t the same messenger.”
“And sometimes you need a better messenger,” Mr. Miller said. “And that’s Kamala.”
Later, at an evening rally in an airport hangar outside Detroit where the campaign announced a crowd of 15,000-strong, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, herself frequently mentioned as a future presidential candidate, declared, “We need a strong woman in the White House and it’s about damn time.”
“This election’s going to be a fight,” Ms. Harris told the Michigan crowd. "We like a good fight.”
Wednesday’s campaign swing was especially important for her and Mr. Walz since Mr. Biden’s winning coalition from four years ago has showed signs of fraying over the summer — particularly in Michigan, which has emerged as a focal point of Democratic divisions over Mr. Biden’s handling of the Israel-Hamas conflict.
With Mr. Biden now out of the race, leaders of the Arab American community and key unions say they are encouraged by the running mate choice. Mr. Walz’s addition to the ticket has soothed some tensions, signaling to some leaders that Ms. Harris had heard concerns about another leading contender for the vice presidential slot, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, who they felt had gone too far in his support for Israel.
“The party is recognizing that there’s a coalition they have to rebuild,” said Abdullah Hammoud, the mayor of Dearborn, Mich. “Picking Walz is another sign of good faith.”
Lingering dissensions were nonetheless on display during Ms. Harris’ Michigan speech, when she was interrupted by protesters opposing Israel’s fighting with Hamas. At first, Ms. Harris said to those trying to disrupt her, “I am here because I believe in democracy and everybody’s voice matters.”
That was a response similar to Mr. Biden’s, who often said when interrupted at his rallies that protesters should be allowed to speak before being removed by security. Ms. Harris, however, then quickly pivoted to a tougher tact, continuing: “But I am speaking now,” sparking cheers from most of the audience.
“If you want Donald Trump to win, then say that,” the vice president continued over the protesters. “Otherwise, I’m speaking.”
Those demonstrating were eventually led away, but not before a tense confrontation between Harris supporters and protesters who screamed at one another.
Trump, meanwhile, has put emphasis on appealing to voters in Midwestern states with his choice of Mr. Vance an Ohio Republican senator, as his running mate. Mr. Vance was even bracketing the Harris-Walz ticket with Michigan and Wisconsin appearances of his own on Wednesday.
The dueling schedules overlapped enough that while Ms. Harris was still greeting a group of Girl Scouts who came to see her arrive at Chippewa Valley Regional Airport in Wisconsin, Vance’s campaign plane landed nearby and was taxiing in the distance.
Ms. Harris posed for a group picture with the girls around the same time Mr. Vance was deplaning, and he began walking over to Air Force Two, trailed by his security detail.
The vice president eventually climbed into her motorcade, and it pulled away before they could interact. Still, that the pair came so close to doing so on a tarmac was unusual given the carefully scripted nature of campaign schedules.
“I just wanted to check out my future plane,” Mr. Vance later told reporters, meaning that he’d travel on Air Force Two should he and Trump be elected in November. He also criticized Ms. Harris for not taking questions from reporters, though she sometimes answers shouted questions while boarding or leaving her plane for campaign stops.
Mr. Vance later told the crowd at his Eau Claire event, “We actually just saw the vice president’s plane” and then joked of reporters traveling with him, “I figured they must be lonely because Kamala Harris doesn’t take any questions.”
“If those people want to call me weird I call it a badge of honor,” Mr. Vance said, responding to a moniker Mr. Walz used to describe him that made the Minnesota governor notable online in the days before Ms. Harris tapped him as her running mate.
Mr. Walz had some critical words for Mr. Vance in both Wisconsin and Michigan but trained most of his sharpest words on Trump, saying the former president “mocks our laws, he sows chaos and division amongst the people and that’s to say nothing of the job he did as president.”
Mr. Walz also stressed that he and Ms. Harris are promoting neighborliness and common community, even suggesting that his state's football fans were happy for Detroit’s long-underperforming NFL team when it nearly made the most-recent Super Bowl: “Vikings fans are proud of the Lions.”
Republicans are trying to portray Ms. Harris and Mr. Walz as too liberal for the Midwest, with Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., saying on a conference call that Mr. Walz is “part of the radical, crazy left as is Vice President Harris.”
But Democratic enthusiasm has surged since Ms. Harris announced her candidacy and picked Mr. Walz as her running mate.
“We love Joe. Joe has been an incredible president, but he just isn’t the same messenger. And sometimes you need a better messenger,” said Dan Miller, from Pelican Lake, Wis., who attended the Walz-Harris rally. “And that’s Kamala.”
The momentum could be pivotal in Detroit, which is nearly 80% Black, where leaders for months had warned administration officials that voter apathy could cost them in a city that’s typically a stronghold for their party. Rev. Wendell Anthony, president of the NAACP Detroit branch, said the excitement in the city now is “mind-blowing.” He likened it to Barack Obama’s first run for president in 2008, when voters waited in long lines to help elect the nation’s first Black president.
Some Democratic leaders in Michigan had grown concerned that choosing the wrong running mate could slow that momentum, however, and fracture a coalition that has only recently started to unify.
Arab American leaders, who hold significant influence in Michigan due to a large presence in metro Detroit, had been vocal in their opposition to Mr. Shapiro due to his past comments regarding the Israel-Hamas conflict.
Those leaders specifically pointed to a comment he made earlier this year regarding protests on university campuses, which they felt unfairly compared the actions of student protesters to those of white supremacists. Mr. Shapiro, who is Jewish, has criticized Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu while remaining a staunch supporter of Israel.
Osama Siblani, the publisher of the Dearborn-based Arab American News and a prominent leader in Michigan’s large Muslim community, was among those who met with White House adviser Tom Perez in Michigan last week. Although Mr. Perez was in the state on official business, he has maintained contact with some Dearborn leaders since he and other top officials traveled there with Mr. Biden in an effort to mend ties with the community.
Mr. Siblani said he met with Mr. Perez for over an hour on July 29 and told him that if Ms. Harris chose Mr. Shapiro, it would “shut down” future conversations.
“Not picking Shapiro is a very good step. It cracks the door open a little more for us,” said Mr. Siblani, who along with Mr. Hammoud emphasized that any meaningful conversations must include policy discussions.
First Published: August 7, 2024, 7:01 p.m.
Updated: August 8, 2024, 2:01 a.m.
