Days after becoming the presumptive Presidential nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris took a slight lead over Donald Trump in an early poll. Her rise to the position has been seamless. Delegates pledged within days and donations poured in. Then on July 23, she gave a speech that completely reframed the 2024 election. She would not wage a conventional contest, but was going to put Trump on “trial” for his behavior and beliefs in the court of public opinion. And voters will be judge and jury. The election won’t be about two old guys facing off against one another but a battle of wits between a former Attorney General and prosecutor and a 78-year-old convicted felon with a checkered past. Harris reminded the audience about her career in law. “I took on perpetrators of all kinds…Predators who abuse women, fraudsters who ripped off consumers, cheaters who broke the rules for their own gain. So hear me when I say, I know Donald Trump’s type.” In a few sentences, she upended Trump’s vaunted strong-versus-weak battle cry with her own law-and-order versus Trump, racists, misogynists, gay-bashers, and anti-abortion fanboys. “The American Dream belongs to all of us,” she said. “We are not going back. The election is a choice between freedom and chaos”.
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