Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz talks about his childhood in a small town in Nebraska during a campaign stop on Aug. 9, 2024 in Glendale, Arizona. Photo by Caitlin Sievers | Arizona Mirror
A massive and enthusiastic crowd gathered Friday evening at Desert Diamond Arena in Glendale to cheer on Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.
Arizona’s top Democrats came out in full force to sing the praises of the top of their ticket, including U.S. Sen. Mark Kelly and his wife, Gabby Giffords, along with Congressman Ruben Gallego, who is running for the Senate, and Phoenix Mayor Kate Gallego.
The more than 15,000-strong crowd that nearly filled the 20,000-seat arena, per the campaign’s estimate, danced to popular hip-hop and rap songs from artists like Lizzo and Saweetie while they waved signs in support of Harris, and ones that signified their affection for Walz’s history as a football coach.
Harris hit on many of the key points her campaign has focused on since it began just over a few weeks ago, including making sure life is more affordable for the middle class and ensuring that young people will be able to afford their own homes in the future.
And she made sure to highlight the differences between her plans for the presidency and those of her Republican opponent, former President Donald Trump.
“We are witnessing a full-on assault against our hard-fought freedoms and rights,” Harris said, including the freedom to vote, to be free of gun violence and for everyone to love who they love openly.
The vice president honed in on key issues for Arizonans, such as climate change, immigration and the right to reproductive freedom.
“I was attorney general of a border state,” she said. “I went after the transnational gangs and traffickers. I prosecuted them in case after case — and I won.”
Harris added that she knows the country’s immigration system is broken, but that strong border security and an earned pathway to citizenship were the solutions.
Trump didn’t support an immigration reform bill introduced in the Senate earlier this year, and the bill failed with little Republican support. Harris promised to sign a reform bill, if elected.
The vice president placed the blame for the fall of Roe v. Wade, and with it the loss of a constitutional right to abortion access, at the feet of her opponent, who appointed three U.S. Supreme Court Justices who ruled to strip a right away from Americans.
“Now, in over 20 states in our nation, there is a Trump abortion ban — many like Arizona, with no exceptions even for rape or incest,” Harris said.
Arizona currently has a ban at 15 weeks of pregnancy, without exceptions for rape or incest, that was enacted by Republicans in 2022. Voters will decide in November whether to approve the Arizona Abortion Access Act.
If voters favor it, the act would enshrine abortion as a right in the state constitution and ban any laws or policies that restrict or deny that right, both up to fetal viability — considered to be around 24 weeks of gestation — and beyond, if a health care provider deems an abortion is necessary to preserve a woman’s life, physical or mental health.
But a ban at the national level would supersede that, and Harris reminded the crowd that both Trump and his running mate, Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance, have favored total bans on the procedure.
“When I am president of the United States, and Congress passes a bill to restore reproductive freedom for every woman in America, I will sign it into law,” Harris said to cheers from the crowd.
The stakes are particularly high this election, she said, with a Supreme Court ruling last month that Trump is “effectively immune” from prosecution for his actions as president and his promise to weaponize the Department of Justice to go after his political enemies.
The crowd was overwhelmingly positive, cheering every time anyone mentioned that Walz, who has ramped up enthusiasm among Democrats since he joined the ticket, is a former teacher and football coach.
But at one point, protesters advocating for a ceasefire in Palestine interrupted Harris. She responded that she respected their voices, and that now is the time for a ceasefire, promising that she and President Joe Biden are working around the clock to make it happen.
Both Harris and Walz worked to bolster their everyman appeal, a clear attempt to strike a contrast with billionaire Trump, who was a child of wealth and famously owned an apartment that was adorned in gold. Harris spoke of her middle class upbringing, with a working mom and a summer job at McDonald’s and Walz’s childhood on a farm in Nebraska.
Walz walked out on stage to raucous applause and cheers from the crowd as “Small Town” by John Mellencamp blasted from the arena’s speakers.
He said that Republicans used to be the party of freedom but that now they want to “invade your exam rooms.”
“When we talk about freedom, we mean the freedom to make your own health care decisions, and for your children to go to school without worrying they will be shot dead,” Walz said, adding that he believes in the Second Amendment as well as common sense gun reform.
He reminded supporters in the crowd that they only had 87 days to persuade voters to support them, saying they could do anything for 87 days.
“We believe in settling our political differences not through violence, but through voting,” he said.
As Harris and Walz headed to their campaign stop in the Valley yesterday, Republicans criticized their lack of action to secure the border.
“Arizona is already bearing the brunt of failed Border Czar Kamala Harris’ open border policies, but the dangerously liberal Harris-Walz ticket wants to further open the floodgates to migrant criminals and deadly fentanyl,” Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Whatley said in a statement.
He predicted that Arizonans would reject their “radical open border agenda” and elect Trump in November.
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