Harris to slam Trump over pandemic on Thursday
Democratic vice presidential nominee Kamala Harris plans to deliver a speech condemning President Donald Trump on Thursday for his handling of the coronavirus pandemic. The speech will come hours before Trump is set to accept renomination for a second term.
Harris will detail a “profound failure of leadership” from Trump and highlight proposals by Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden to control the virus and confront the economic fallout, Biden’s campaign told The Associated Press.
With Trump planning an evening address from the White House lawn, Harris’ afternoon remarks from Washington will be the Democrats’ main counter to the president on the final day of the Republicans’ convention.
“Part of what I will be talking about is that they’re dealing in lies, but also they are not grounded in reality,” Harris said during a Wednesday fundraiser, adding that many Americans are grieving the loss of loved ones and normalcy amid the pandemic. “They want better than this, and we are better than this,” she said.
Biden has made similar arguments about Trump for months, and Harris picked up on that criticism in both her introductory speech as Biden’s pick and when she accepted the party’s nomination last week during the Democratic Convention.
But the California senator’s words on Thursday are billed as her most focused denunciation of Trump since joining the ticket. Her tack will test an argument that the former prosecutor tried last summer, as a White House candidate, to show that she is ready to “prosecute the case” against Trump and his “rap sheet.”