Beyoncé
Rallies for Harris in Houston With a Message for the Battlegrounds
Kamala
Harris used Texas’ strict abortion ban as a cautionary tale as she sought to
lay out the stakes of a deadlocked election.
Beyoncé
and Kelly Rowland expressed support for Vice President Kamala Harris at a
campaign event focused on abortion rights in Houston on Friday night.
We are
grabbing back the pen from those who are trying to write an American story that
would deny the right for women to make our own decisions about our bodies. I’m
not here as a celebrity. I’m not here as a politician. I’m here as a mother. A
mother who cares deeply about the world my children and all of our children
live in. A world where we have the freedom to control our bodies. It’s time for
America to sing a new song. Our voices sing a chorus of unity. They sing a song
of dignity and opportunity. Are y’all ready to add your voice to the new
American song? Because I am. So let’s do this. Ladies and gentlemen, please
give a big, loud Texas welcome to the next president of the United States: Vice
President Kamala Harris.
Reid J.
EpsteinJ. David Goodman Lisa Lerer
By Reid J.
EpsteinJ. David Goodman and Lisa Lerer
Reid J.
Epstein and J. David Goodman reported from Houston, and Lisa Lerer reported
from New York.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/26/us/politics/harris-beyonce-rally-houston.html
Oct. 26,
2024
Updated 1:19
a.m. ET
Vice
President Kamala Harris diverted from the presidential battlegrounds on Friday
to receive the endorsement of the global superstar Beyoncé in Texas, in an
event almost entirely focused on abortion rights.
With the
presidential race deadlocked, the Harris campaign sought to use Beyoncé’s
status — particularly in her hometown, Houston — to focus attention on the
state’s near-total abortion ban as a cautionary tale for what could happen
throughout the country should former President Donald J. Trump win another term
in the White House.
The rally in
Houston was not only her campaign’s largest but also its most emotionally
charged event since she became the Democratic nominee. Beyoncé offered a speech
focused on a more optimistic future, and the wrenching stories of Texas women
who suffered life-threatening health complications as a result of being denied
proper care for pregnancy complications were center stage.
Ms. Harris
and many of the speakers laid the blame solely on Mr. Trump, who frequently
boasts of appointing three of the Supreme Court justices who voted to overturn
Roe v. Wade in 2022.
While Mr.
Trump has promised to leave abortion laws to individual states, and says he
would veto a national ban, allies of the former president and officials who
served in his administration are planning ways to restrict abortion rights that
would go beyond the laws enacted in conservative states across the country.
Ms. Harris
warned that, if elected to another term, Mr. Trump would move to ban abortion
nationally — regardless of his campaign promises.
“Though we
are in Texas tonight, for anyone watching from another state, if you think you
are protected from Trump abortion bans because you live in Michigan,
Pennsylvania, Nevada, New York, California or any state where voters or
legislators have protected reproductive freedom, please know: No one is
protected,” she said. “Because a Donald Trump national ban will outlaw abortion
in every single state.”
By pairing
dire warnings with the reach of a celebrity of Beyoncé’s stratosphere, the
Harris campaign hoped to break through a crowded and diffuse news environment
to get voters in formation before Election Day. The aim was to create a moment
that resonated with disengaged voters and the Republican-leaning women who Ms.
Harris’s team believes are key to the vice president’s potential success.
Beyoncé’s
appearance was notable for the pop star, who is a frequent supporter of
Democratic candidates but rarely delivers extended remarks about her political
beliefs. Her song “Freedom” has become the anthem of the Harris campaign, used
to introduce the vice president at nearly every appearance. After Mr. Trump
used a clip of the song in a video, her lawyers reportedly threatened to send a
cease-and-desist letter.
“I’m not
here as a celebrity,” Beyoncé told Friday’s crowd, which the Harris campaign
put at 30,000. “I’m not here as a politician. I’m here as a mother, a mother
who cares deeply about the world my children and all of our children live in.”
She
continued: “Imagine our daughters growing up seeing what’s possible with no
ceilings, no limitations. Imagine our grandmothers, imagine what they feel
right now.”
Other
speakers included Beyoncé’s mother, the singer’s longtime friend and former
bandmate Kelly Rowland, the Texas country music legend Willie Nelson and
Representative Colin Allred, the Democratic challenger to Senator Ted Cruz,
Republican of Texas. Several women who have sought abortion care since the
Supreme Court’s reversal of Roe and the mother of Amber Thurman, the Georgia
woman who died after delays in her medical care connected to Georgia’s abortion
ban, also spoke. The rally also featured a group of obstetricians who said they
were no longer able to practice medicine as they saw fit in Texas since the
state banned most abortion care.
On the
outdoor stadium’s video boards, Ms. Harris played clips of Mr. Trump bragging
about his role in doing away with abortion rights in between testimonials from
women who have suffered as a result of strict bans that prevented them from
getting care.
In a race in
which polling shows a substantial gender gap, with women favoring Ms. Harris
and men backing Mr. Trump, the vice president made an explicit abortion-rights
appeal to men, almost pleading with them to vote for women’s rights.
“Men across
America do not want to see their daughters and wives and sisters and mothers
put at risk,” she said. “The men of America don’t want this.”
Yet, even as
abortion rights remain one of Ms. Harris’s strongest issues, some abortion
rights activists and political strategists believe the cause may not maintain
the same level of political resonance in a presidential year. In battleground
states, one in five voters wrongly blame President Biden for ending the
constitutional right to an abortion, even though Mr. Trump was the one who
appointed three of the justices who voted to overturn Roe.
The Harris
campaign sees the personal stories of women as one of its most powerful
political tools, a way to highlight the real-life impacts of the abortion
restrictions that have swept conservative states and to reach less politically
engaged voters.
A woman
named Ondrea, whose story of failing to receive proper medical treatment after
a miscarriage because of the Texas abortion ban was recently featured in a
Harris campaign ad, recounted how she was denied an abortion after discovering
her baby would not survive delivery.
Her voice
breaking, she described developing sepsis, a life-threatening pregnancy
complication, facing a partial lung collapse, hours of surgery and months of
difficult recovery.
“Texas
abortion bans unleashed by Donald Trump almost cost me my life and have left me
with physical and emotional scars,” she told the crowd of cheering supporters.
“This election, I proudly cast my vote for Kamala Harris because lives depend
on it.”
As the race
enters its final stretch, the Harris campaign is going to great lengths to make
its rallies feel like events that transcend politics. Bruce Springsteen and
former President Barack Obama both appeared before a Harris campaign crowd of
more than 20,000 on Thursday night in Georgia, and Mr. Obama’s wife, the
more-popular Michelle Obama, is scheduled to rally supporters with Ms. Harris
in Michigan on Saturday. John Legend is set to perform at a rally Sunday in
Philadelphia, and the band Mumford & Sons is scheduled to play next week at
a Harris rally in Madison, Wis.
On Friday in
Houston, the disc jockey warming up the crowd in the hours before Ms. Harris
and Beyoncé took the stage repeatedly called the rally “the biggest political
event ever” (not quite) and urged people to cheer for “the first Black woman
president” — which would be true if Ms. Harris wins but not a point she or her
campaign has emphasized.
DeMarkus
Phipps, 33, a city worker, said that he had seen Beyoncé in concert several
times but that he had come to the event for Ms. Harris.
“This is a
once in a lifetime event,” his cousin, Courtney Jones, 36, said. “I wanted to
be part of it.”
Both she and
Mr. Phipps said they had already voted early for Ms. Harris. So, too, had one
of their nieces, Asia Phipps, 20, her first time voting for president.
“I felt
special,” she said. Asked if she had come more for Ms. Harris or for Beyoncé,
she smiled. “Both!”
Erica L.
Green contributed reporting.
Reid J.
Epstein covers campaigns and elections from Washington. Before joining The
Times in 2019, he worked at The Wall Street Journal, Politico, Newsday and The
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. More about Reid J. Epstein
J. David
Goodman is the Houston bureau chief for The Times, reporting on Texas and
Oklahoma. More about J. David Goodman
Lisa Lerer
is a national political reporter for The Times, based in New York. She has
covered American politics for nearly two decades. More about Lisa Lerer
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