With six days until the election, Vice President Kamala Harris campaigned in Harrisburg on Wednesday and stuck to her campaign’s central message: that former President Donald Trump would pose a threat to democracy if re-elected.
Harris said that if Trump is elected to a second term, he will seek revenge, not progress.
“This is someone who doesn’t think about how to improve their life,” she said. “He is someone who is unstable, obsessed with revenge, consumed with grief and craving unchecked power.”
Pennsylvania has 19 electoral votes, the most of any swing state, making it: “you have to win” state for any of the candidates. During her 25-minute speech at the Farm Show Complex, Harris emphasized the importance of the remaining days of the campaign.
“We need you to vote,” she said. “Because we only have six days left. And one of the most crucial choices in our lives. And we have work to do.
Bethany Thomas of Reading was among the 5,000 people who met with Harris on Wednesday and was excited to be there, expressing concern about the future of reproductive rights and the fate of her grandchildren if Trump wins the election.
“I really don’t want old white guys making decisions for them [her grandchildren]– she said. “It’s a very personal and private decision and you shouldn’t involve the government in it.”
Reproductive rights were a topic discussed by several speakers.
“I will not allow my daughter to grow up in a country where she has more rights and freedoms than her mother and grandmother,” Lt. Gov. Austin Davis told the crowd.
Harris reminded voters about the three U.S. Supreme Court justices appointed by Trump and their role in overturning Roe v. Wade.
““Right now in America, one in three women live in a state where Trump bans abortion, and many of them ban abortion without exceptions, even in cases of rape and incest, which is immoral,” she said.
She also criticized the Heritage Foundation 2025 project, a conservative policy proposal that would overhaul the federal government and give significant power to the executive branch.
Trump and his running mate, Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio), have tried to distance themselves from it, but there have been some members the Trump administration wrote portions of the “Leadership Mandate” that provide detailed information about Project 2025 and Vance wrote the attacker for a book authored by the chief plan supervisor.
At some points during her speech, Palestinian supporters spoke out accusing her and President Joe Biden of genocide, even though they had been asked to leave.
Cassandra Blaney drove nearly three hours from Bradford County, where Trump scored 45 points in 2020, to show her support for Harris.
She said she was concerned about the economy and Trump’s plan would not fix the situation.
“I think what’s really remarkable is that Nobel Prize-winning conservative economists are telling us that his policies will sink our economy,” she said.
Twenty-three Nobel Prize-winning economists signed letter calling Harris’ economic plan “much better.”
“His [Trump’s] policies, including high tariffs even on goods from our friends and allies and regressive tax cuts for corporations and individuals, will lead to higher prices, larger deficits and greater inequality,” the letter says.
During her speech, Harris touched on parts of her economic plan, including tax cuts for 100 million Americans, a a federal ban on price gouging of groceries and a proposal to build more affordable housing.
On Saturday, Trump hosted a rally at Madison Square Garden where comedian Tony Hinchcliffe called Puerto Rico “a pile of garbage in the middle of the ocean.”
Aida Crespo, a Puerto Rican who moved to Harrisburg, was offended by the comments. She said the half-million Puerto Ricans in Pennsylvania will matter on Election Day.
“Puerto Ricans in Pennsylvania will pay their respects to the island on November 5,” she said.
Kush Desai, The Trump campaign’s communications director in Pennsylvania said Harris’ rally was not intended to reach GOP voters.
“We know who Kamala Harris didn’t bother to reach out to in Harrisburg today: the millions of patriotic, Trump-supporting Pennsylvanians whom Joe Biden and the Democrats consider ‘trash,’ ‘deplorable,’ ‘racist’ and ‘Nazi.’ . ”he said in a statement.
Harris concluded her speech with a message of unity and a call for people to get to the polls.
“Let us remember that there is much more that unites us than what divides us,” she said. “So remember that your voice is your voice and your voice is your strength.”
YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE.
