Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Barack Obama made the case that Donald Trump is too “out of touch” to be president at her campaign’s biggest rally of the election cycle so far.
During their joint event in Atlanta, Georgia, Obama and Harris painted Trump as a wealthy man who can’t understand the challenges that everyday Americans face.
“Just imagine the Oval Office in three months … there’s a choice everyone has to make,” Harris said. “It’s either Donald Trump stewing over his enemies list. Or it’s me, working for you, checking off my to-do list.”
Harris compared her upbringing to Trump’s, framing herself as a leader who grew up in a middle-class family and casting herself as more relatable. She drew a strong reaction from the crowd when she brought up abortion, noting Trump’s refusal to “acknowledge the pain and the suffering” caused by the overturning of Roe v. Wade and pointing to Georgia as an example of a state with an abortion ban in place because of that Supreme Court decision.
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“He insists that quote everybody wanted for Roe vs. Wade to be overturned,” Harris said, referring to one of Trump’s inaccurate talking points on abortion. “Which is just a further example of how out of touch the man is.”
Harris also hit on many of the same points that she has made throughout her campaign, focusing on policy differences she has with Trump. She continued her outreach to Republican voters and made an appeal for their support with an argument that Trump is a threat to democracy. She also cast doubt on his ability to do the job because of his age and mental acuity.
It was a major moment of her campaign in which she nearly filled the venue with a crowd of 23,000 people in attendance. Her highly anticipated guests, Obama and singer Bruce Springsteen, helped headline the event.
Harris wasn’t the only one who made the case that Trump is disconnected from the average voter.
Obama riffed about Trump’s desire to end the Affordable Care Act, adding that Trump only wants it gone because Obama passed it and pointing out that Trump doesn’t actually have a viable replacement option. He brought up Trump’s “concepts of a plan” remark.
“You could try this at home,” Obama said. “‘Honey, did you throw out the trash?’ ‘I have a concept of a plan to throw out the trash.’ How is that going to go over? On the couch. If it wouldn’t work for you, then why should it work for the next president of the United States?”
Obama has played a key role for the campaign, helping to raise more than $84 million for the Democratic presidential candidate in the last year, according to his team. He has made several stops on behalf of the Harris-Walz campaign, including in Wisconsin, Michigan and Nevada.
The stop in Georgia on Thursday was in yet another battleground state, which Harris is trying to keep competitive.
But much of the night was a play on nostalgia for a presidency some younger voters may not have the clearest memories of — Harris recalled going to Iowa ahead of the 2008 caucuses to help Obama in his first run for president.
She even led the crowd in a familiar chant: “Yes, we can.”
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Torrence Banks is a NOTUS reporter and an Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow.
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