Harris confronts racism in America and Clinton torches Trump: Key moments from the Dem convention

2020 CONVENTIONS

Harris confronts racism in America and Clinton torches Trump: Key moments from the Dem convention

 

The third night of programming also provided emotional testimonials on gun violence, climate change and immigration.

 

By QUINT FORGEY, CAITLIN OPRYSKO and CATHERINE KIM

08/19/2020 09:48 PM EDT

Updated: 08/19/2020 11:28 PM EDT

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/08/19/dnc-convention-wednesday-key-moments-398904

 

Powerhouse women dominated the third night of the Democratic National Convention, with Kamala Harris bluntly addressing racism in America, and Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi and Elizabeth Warren each taking turns to eviscerate President Donald Trump.

 

Former President Barack Obama also took on a prime speaking role, accusing Trump of cravenly treating the presidency like a reality show.

 

 

Here are the key moments from the evening.

 

 

Kamala Harris confronts racism in America

Kamala Harris: 'There is no vaccine for racism'

 

As Kamala Harris accepted the Democratic Party's vice presidential nomination — becoming the first Black woman and first Asian American to join a major party presidential ticket — she argued that "structural racism" had compounded the coronavirus's consequences for communities of color across America.

 

"This virus has no eyes, and yet it knows exactly how we see each other — and how we treat each other," the California senator said in her keynote speech.

 

"And let's be clear — there is no vaccine for racism. We've gotta do the work."

 

The highly anticipated remarks from Biden's running mate also focused heavily on the former prosecutor's biography, reintroducing the daughter of immigrants to a national audience and casting her as a crusader for justice with a deep law enforcement background.

 

Former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton repeatedly invoked her 2016 election loss as she urged Americans to vote — warning that only an “overwhelming” turnout at the polls could thwart President Donald Trump’s attempts to “sneak or steal his way” to a second term in office.

 

“For four years, people have said to me, ‘I didn’t realize how dangerous he was.’ ‘I wish I could go back and do it over.’ Or worst, ‘I should have voted.’ Well, this can’t be another woulda, coulda, shoulda election,” Clinton said.

 

“Don’t forget,” she added, “Joe and Kamala can win by 3 million votes and still lose. Take it from me. So we need numbers overwhelming, so Trump can’t sneak or steal his way to victory.”

 

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi presented the possibility of a future with gun control, affordable healthcare and clean energy, but made it clear there’s one obstacle: “Who is standing in the way? Mitch McConnell and Donald Trump,” she said.

 

Pelosi pointed to the administration’s heavily criticized response to the pandemic, and the 170,000-plus deaths that have devastated the country.

 

She said the negligence created the “worst health and economic catastrophe in our history.” And her attacks didn’t end there: she criticized Trump’s track record of attacking women’s rights, including his threat to affordable childcare, access to abortions and equal pay. To the women affected by his policies, she urged them to vote for the Biden-Harris ticket.

 

"As speaker of the House, I have seen firsthand Donald Trump's disrespect for facts, for working families and for women in particular,” she said. “Disrespect written into its policies toward our health and our rights—not just his conduct."

 

In contrast to Trump, Pelosi highlighted Biden as a man whose heart is “full of love for America,” and showed her strong support for Harris as “a witness to the women of this nation that our voices will be heard.”

 

From a classroom in Massachusetts that reflected her past as a teacher, Sen. Elizabeth Warren accused Trump of utterly failing to combat the coronavirus, worsening societal inequalities in the process.

 

“Donald Trump's ignorance and incompetence have always been a danger to our country,” she said. “Covid-19 was Trump's biggest test. He failed miserably."

 

Childcare was hard to find before the pandemic, the former Democratic candidate said, but now it’s nearly impossible. And that’s not the only struggle parents are facing due to the pandemic, according to Warren. She pointed to the faltering economy and record number of Covid-19 deaths, both of which are crises that impact Black and Brown communities disproportionately, as proof of the president’s incompetency. Warren spoke to the millions of Americans who are at risk of eviction and live paycheck-to-paycheck due to the pandemic as she made a plea to Americans to vote.

 

"This crisis is bad, and it didn't have to be this way,” she said. “This crisis is on Donald Trump and the Republicans who enabled him. On November 3rd, we will hold them all accountable.”

 

The Democratic National Convention’s third night of programming opened with a series of slick videos spotlighting the country’s gun violence epidemic and featured remarks from Americans whose lives have been touched by mass shootings.

 

“We are at a crossroads,” said former Arizona Rep. Gabby Giffords, a prominent gun control advocate who was shot in the head by a would-be assassin in 2011.

 

“We can let the shooting continue, or we can act. We can protect our families. Our future. We can vote. We can be on the right side of history,” she said. “We must elect Joe Biden. He was there for me. He’ll be there for you, too.”

 

Democrats have failed to push comprehensive gun reform legislation through Congress in recent years despite several mass shootings at schools and other public places, and the issue is an important component of Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden’s agenda.

 

Biden helped author the Federal Assault Weapons Ban in the 1994 crime bill when he was serving as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. He has called for bans on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, and said he would institute a national buyback program for assault weapons as president.

 

Former President Barack Obama blasted his successor as unserious and self-centered, accusing Trump of using the office only to benefit himself and his friends.

 

Trump, he said, views the presidency as no more than a “reality show that he can use to get the attention he craves,” and his failure to lead has resulted in the deaths of thousands of Americans during the coronavirus pandemic.

 

“I never expected that my successor would embrace my vision or continue my policies,” Obama said. “I did hope, for the sake of our country, that Donald Trump might show some interest in taking the job seriously. But he never did.”

 

“Donald Trump hasn’t grown into the job because he can’t,” he continued. “And the consequences of that failure are severe: 170,000 Americans dead. Millions of jobs gone. Our worst impulses unleashed, our proud reputation around the world badly diminished, and our democratic institutions threatened like never before.”

 

New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham highlighted her state’s approach to climate change, which includes a sweeping 2019 executive order that reduces greenhouse gas emissions in New Mexico by at least 45 percent by 2030. She’s also encouraged state agencies to promote policies that push clean energy and reduce pollution.

 

"We know time is running out to save our planet,” she said. “We have the chance this November to end two existential crises: The Trump presidency and the environmental annihilation he represents.”

 

Meanwhile, Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency has rolled back nearly 100 environmental rules since 2017, many established during the Obama administration. Most recently, it cut back on methane emission regulations for the oil and gas industry on Thursday, and environmental groups have already vowed they will sue to stop the measure.

 

In a touching video, the daughter of a U.S. Marine's wife who was deported to Mexico by the Trump administration put a sympathetic face to the president’s immigration policy.

 

In a letter to Trump, 11-year-old Estela Juarez recounted how her mother came to the United States illegally as a teenager more than two decades earlier, and married her father who served in South America, Africa and Iraq with the Marines.

 

“My dad thought you would protect military families so he voted for you in 2016, Mr. President. He says he won't vote for you again after what you did to our family,” Juarez said, as news clips about her mother’s deportation played. “Instead of protecting us, you tore our world apart.”

 

The clip spliced in Trump’s past comments about immigrants, including a vow to start “moving them out on Day One,” and references to MS-13 gang members as “animals.” It included footage of migrant children separated from their parents at the border, as Juarez asserts that some of the kids separated from their parents by the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” policy “are now orphans because of you.”

 

“Mr. President, my mom is the wife of a proud American Marine and a mother of two American children. We are American families. We need a president who will bring people together not tear them apart. Sincerely, Estela,” she concluded.