Kamala Harris teamed up with Liz Cheney in three battleground states on Monday to make a bipartisan appeal to Republicans who might be uneasy about Donald Trump, describing the former president as a malignant force that must be excised from American politics.
In an election that's expected to be decided by thin margins, Democrats are trying to persuade enough people to cross the aisle to nudge Harris over the finish line. It's a strategy that goes against longtime political doctrine that suggests candidates must tend to their ideological base above all else, sometimes to the detriment of reaching out to swing voters.
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But with Trump alienating some Republicans with his election denial and acting increasingly erratically on the campaign trail, Harris is betting there's a path to victory with college-educated suburban voters who have already been drifting toward the Democratic Party.
Cheney, a former congresswoman from Wyoming, said Harris would “lead this country with a sincere heart.”
“We might not agree on every issue," she said at the third event of the day in Brookfield, Wisconsin, near Milwaukee. "But she is somebody you can trust.”
Cheney, the daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, was essentially exiled from the Republican Party for participating in a congressional investigation of Trump’s involvement in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. She lost her congressional seat in a primary battle two years ago.
It's not the only issue where Cheney has broken with her party, as she made clear Monday. Even though she considers herself to be “pro-life,” she said abortion restrictions have gone too far since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.
“I have been very troubled, deeply troubled by what I have watched happen in so many states,” Cheney said.
Taken in their totality, her comments over the course of the day amounted to an extraordinary attempt to roll out the welcome mat for Republican voters to back Harris, a politician that Cheney herself once described as a “radical liberal.”
“This is not a normal election,” said Charles Sykes, a conservative commentator who moderated the Wisconsin event. “Dogs and cats together, in this strange moment.”
Harris, the Democratic vice president, talked about Trump as a cruel figure who has exhausted Americans with his divisiveness.
“He tends to encourage us as Americans to point our fingers at each other," she said. "That’s not in our best interests. The vast majority of us have so much more in common than what separates us.”
At times, Harris and Cheney spoke wistfully of a time when Democrats and Republicans could argue about their differences without the country's constitutional foundation at stake.
“The strength of our democracy requires a strong two-party system,” Harris said.
With just over two weeks to go before the presidential election, Harris is looking for support from every possible voter. Her campaign is simultaneously hoping to persuade those who haven’t made up their minds, mobilize any Democrats considering sitting this one out, and pick off Republican voters in areas where support for Trump may be fading.
All three of the counties visited by Harris and Cheney on Monday — Chester County in Pennsylvania, Oakland County in Michigan and Waukesha County in Wisconsin — were won by Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor and U.S. ambassador to the United Nations who ran against Trump for the Republican nomination.
A few votes here and there could add up to an overall win. In Waukesha County, for example, Haley won more than 9,000 primary votes even after she dropped out of the race. Overall, Wisconsin was decided for President Joe Biden in 2020 by just 20,000 votes. In-person early voting in the state starts Tuesday.
Trump lashed out at Cheney on social media, calling her “dumb as a rock” and accusing her of being a “war hawk.”
Cheney reminded people that “you can vote your conscience and not ever have to say a word to anybody.”
“There will be millions of Republicans who do that on Nov. 5,” she predicted during the second event of the day in Royal Oak, Michigan, near Detroit.
Harris referenced a report in Bob Woodward's latest book that Gen. Mark Milley, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Trump is “fascist to the core.”
She also said voters should take Trump’s rhetoric seriously rather than write it off as a “sick sense of humor.”
“Some people find it humorous what he says and it’s just silly,” she said. “But understand how serious it is.”
The more intimate settings Monday were a shift for Harris, whose campaign has mostly focused on rallies with thousands of people. The audiences listened intently to her and Cheney, sometimes nodding along or smiling. During Harris’ story about a young boy who was afraid of a school classroom where there wasn’t a closet to hide from a shooter, some eyes welled with tears.
Trump has frequently tried to paint Harris, who is from deep blue California, as a radical liberal, but she struck a moderate tone during her appearances with Cheney.
At the first event of the day, in Malvern, Pennsylvania, near Philadelphia, Harris promised to “invite good ideas from wherever they come” and “cut red tape." She also said “there should be a healthy two-party system” in the country.
“We need to be able to have these good intense debates about issues that are grounded in fact,” Harris said.
“Imagine!” Cheney responded.
“Let’s start there!” Harris said as the audience clapped. “Can you believe that’s an applause line?”
____ Megerian reported from Washington.