-
Kamala Harris and Tim Walz made a quick trip to Wisconsin to headline a rally during the DNC.
-
The Democratic ticket took advantage of the key swing state’s proximity to Chicago to campaign there.
-
It’s a stark contrast from 2016, when Hillary Clinton skipped campaigning in the state.
As thousands of Democrats from across the country attended the second day of the Democratic National Convention at the United Center in Chicago, Vice President Kamala Harris, the party’s new standard-bearer, spoke remotely from a large campaign rally in Milwaukee.
Why would Harris choose to be in Milwaukee when the party’s biggest spectacle in 2024 was just one state away?
While Harris could have stayed in Chicago for the entire convention, she and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, are on a mission to win Wisconsin in November.
It’s the kind of tactic that could easily be overlooked amid the DNC festivities. But it reflects how the holiday is still haunted by 2016, when former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton did not campaign in Wisconsin as the Democratic presidential nominee and narrowly lost the state that year to then-Republican nominee Donald Trump.
That’s why Harris’ rally in Milwaukee was so important:
Leaning on the Midwest
Barring a massive political earthquake, the Harris-Walz ticket will win Illinois convincingly in the fall.
But Democrats want to win Michigan and Wisconsin, because both states are still a fundamental part of the party’s “blue wall,” which Trump broke in 2016 when he defeated Clinton in the Electoral College.
Harris’ campaign sent a clear message by holding the rally in the most populous city in one of the key swing states. And to put an exclamation point on the event, which drew about 15,000 people, it was held at the Fiserv Forum, the site of last month’s Republican National Convention.
A key goal for Harris’ campaign is to strengthen her position in Wisconsin. If Harris can replicate former President Barack Obama’s formula for boosting Democratic turnout in Milwaukee and Madison while also appealing to union members, suburbanites and rural swing voters, she’ll be on track to win the Midwestern state.
Since Harris’ campaign launched in July, she has visited Wisconsin three times, including her most recent appearance in Milwaukee. And on Tuesday, she took advantage of the city’s proximity to Chicago to boost her visibility beyond the confines of the Democratic convention.
Democrats Have Not Forgotten 2016
When Trump formally entered the political scene, his campaign focused on working-class voters who supported Obama in 2008 and 2012. In 2016, Trump managed to rally just enough voters to deny Clinton victory in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, effectively cutting off her path to the White House, as she also lost Sun Belt states like Arizona, Florida and North Carolina.
Clinton’s campaign eight years ago had no qualms about emphasizing the historic nature of her candidacy, meaning she could become the first-ever female U.S. president. But Harris appears to have given less thought to that “first” and has focused squarely on the politics of the moment as she leads a new ticket following President Joe Biden’s exit from the 2024 race.
In 2016, Clinton lost to Trump in Wisconsin by a margin of 0.77%, representing about 23,000 of the nearly 3 million votes cast.
Four years later, Biden defeated Trump by a margin of 0.63%, with a difference of about 21,000 votes between the two men and nearly 3.3 million votes cast statewide in the presidential race.
With these razor-thin margins in mind, Harris is trying to get every vote she can in Wisconsin. And Trump isn’t far behind.
Read the original article on Business Insider
