Sunday, Sept. 29, 2024 | 9:48 p.m.
Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris held a rally Sunday night in downtown Las Vegas at the same venue where her November opponent spoke two weeks earlier.
Harris, at a fundraising event earlier this weekend in California, couldn’t resist needling Republican nominee Donald Trump about how her rallies were drawing bigger crowds.
That appeared to be the case in Las Vegas, where Nevada Democrats said 7,500 supporters attended Sunday’s rally. Trump drew 6,000 earlier this month.
U.S. Rep. Susie Lee, D-Nev., warmed up the crowd by saying Trump’s campaign visit brought the “crazy train,” and the vice president’s “the American dream train — where everyone hops on board.”
Harris used a 30-minute address to detail her economic vision to grow the middle class, proudly saying, “I come from the middle class, and I will never forget where I come from.”
In contrast, she said Trump had a “silver-platter” background and has filed for bankruptcy on multiple occasions.
Harris also expressed a sense of urgency in her message, with just 37 days until Election Day. She said the race with Trump will be “tight until the very end.”
“Folks, the election is here, and we need to energize and organize and mobilize and remember the vote is your voice. Your voice is your power,” Harris said. “Don’t ever let anyone take your power from you.”
Harris urged attendees to show “one of the highest forms of patriotism” and create a voting plan. She said every active registered voter will receive a mail-in-ballot; early voting begins Oct. 19.
“Do we believe in the promise of America?” Harris asked the cheering audience. “And are we ready to fight for it? And when we fight, we win.”
She touched on several policy proposals, including eliminating “unnecessary degree requirements” for federal jobs, providing a $50,000 tax deduction to start a small business and building 3 million homes in four years.
Harris also discussed immigration and security at the southern United States border — a major campaign platform for Trump.
Trump plans to use the National Guard to round up millions of undocumented residents, but he isn’t saying how he’d identify who is here illegally. His goal is removing 15 million to 20 million people, although in 2022 there were just 11 million migrants living in the U.S. without permanent legal status, according to The Associated Press.
Harris, in her Las Vegas speech, called for an easier path to citizenship and more resources for the Department of Justice to prosecute transnational crime. The vice president added that Trump “preferred to run (his campaign) on a problem instead of fixing it.”
“(Trump) cruelly separated families and plans to do it again, and he continues to fan the flames of fear and division,” Harris said.
Harris also touched on gun violence. Tuesday is the seventh anniversary of the Oct. 1, 2017, mass shooting on the Strip that immediately killed 58 people and injured hundreds of others. Some attendees at Harris’ rally wore shirts that said, “Vegas Strong,” paying tribute to the victims.
“After 1 October, Nevada proved that smart gun safety laws are just common sense,” Harris said.
Jill Montgomery, a teacher and Las Vegas resident, was one of the attendees showing support for the victims. She said the Oct. 1 shooting left an impact on her life because she had multiple family members, friends and colleagues in attendance at the country music festival where the shooting occurred.
“I figured it was just a way to show that we’re still strong seven years later,” Montgomery said about her shirt.
U.S. Rep. Steven Horsford, D-Nev., spoke to attendees about how gun violence affected his life. His father was killed in a shooting while working at a convenience store.
He drew parallels from his experience to the numbers of people across the country who “get that tragic call that someone in their life has died due to senseless gun violence.”
Horsford said Harris has championed legislation seeking deeper background checks for gun purchases. She also led the White House’s first office on gun violence prevention.
The rally also featured members of the Laborers’ International Union of North America sitting behind the stage wearing bright orange shirts.
Until the election, Alexis Soderstrom and her peers from her local UFCW will be canvassing in Nevada, only returning home to Northern California the day after the election.
“We are sending people from all over the country to work, because this is so important, this freedom,” Soderstrom said. “And it matters for everybody.”
Since Sept. 16, Soderstrom has been part of a door-to-door outreach effort in Las Vegas that is geared toward fellow union members. They have reached about 28,000 people so far, she said.
“The working class, they’re talking to us,” Soderstrom said. “They have no problem. Even if there’s a language barrier, they’ll still talk to us. They want to hear. They want their voices heard for the first time.”
The Republican National Committee said in a statement that Nevadans are “increasingly fed up with” how Harris and Democrats have handled issues like the economy and border.
“A stop in Nevada does not change the fact that Nevadans feel they are worse off today than they were four years ago,” RNC Nevada Communications Director Halee Dobbins said.