US Vice President Kamala Harris has secured the most delegates ahead of next month's Democratic National Convention.
US Vice President Kamala Harris has vowed to fight Donald Trump as the Democratic presidential nominee, invoking her former career as a prosecutor who took on “predators” and “scammers.”
In her first campaign appearance since her boss Joe Biden dropped out of the presidential race, Harris said Monday that she had confronted “perpetrators of all stripes” while serving as a prosecutor and attorney general in her home state of California.
“Predators who abused women, scammers who ripped off consumers, cheaters who broke the rules for their own benefit. So, listen to me when I tell you that I know Donald Trump’s kind,” Harris told campaign staff in Wilmington, Delaware.
Harris, 59, previously leaned on her record as a prosecutor during her failed 2020 Democratic primary campaign, which included the slogan: “Kamala Harris, for the people.”
Since then, Republican presidential candidate Trump has been convicted of falsifying business records, found civilly liable for sexually assaulting a magazine columnist and charged in two criminal cases related to efforts to overturn the result of the 2020 election.
Harris's combative stump speech came as she cemented her status as the de facto Democratic nominee amid a wave of endorsements from top party figures including former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.
Donors have also rallied around Harris, contributing a record $81 million in the 24 hours since she announced her bid for the White House, according to her campaign.
While Democrats won't officially choose their nominee until their national convention next month, Harris has already secured the backing of far more delegates than the number needed to win the nomination.
As of Monday evening, Harris had more than 2,500 delegates, far more than the 1,976 needed to clinch the nomination on the first ballot, according to an Associated Press tally.
In his first public remarks since stepping aside amid concerns about his age and physical condition, Biden, 81, called into Harris's event to pledge his support for her campaign.
“The name has changed at the top of the paper, but the mission has not changed at all,” he said, adding that abandoning the program was “the right thing to do.”
While Democrats hope Harris will energize demoralized voters after weeks of turmoil over Biden’s faltering candidacy, she faces lingering questions about her electability.
The former senator has trailed Trump in most opinion polls (only doing as well or slightly better than Biden) and has struggled to gain momentum in her 2020 presidential campaign, dropping out of the race after falling behind Biden, Sen. Bernie Sanders and Sen. Elizabeth Warren in polls in her home state.
In her speech, Harris, who would be the first Black woman president if elected in November, cast the election as a choice between the future and the past.
“Our campaign has always been about two different versions of what we see as the future of our country — two different visions of our country, one focused on the future and one focused on the past,” Harris said.
“Donald Trump wants to take our country back to a time when many of our fellow Americans did not have full freedoms and rights.”
Harris said Trump would put Social Security on the “chopping block” and treat health care as “a privilege for the rich.”
“The United States has tried these economic policies before. They do not lead to property, but to inequality and economic injustice, and we will not turn back,” he said.
“We are not going back. They are not going to take us back.”
