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Supporters hold signs and cheer as Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at West Allis Central High School in West Allis, Wisconsin, Tuesday, July 23, 2024. Angela Major/WPR
When Vice President Kamala Harris appeared in the Milwaukee area on Tuesday, her rally set a record for attendance for a 2024 Democratic presidential campaign.
Her appearance at the campaign rally came less than 48 hours after President Joe Biden’s surprise announcement Sunday that he was dropping out of the race, but campaign officials said so many people RSVPed to a location originally planned for Biden’s support stop that organizers had to change the location at the last minute.
Now, video from that rally is the basis for Harris’ first official campaign ad, and the Wisconsin Democrat says there’s renewed energy behind her new campaign with just over three months to go.
“We are seeing growing grassroots enthusiasm across the state, with calls and emails from excited volunteers asking what more they can do to help elect Kamala Harris,” Timothy White, Wisconsin spokesman for the Harris campaign, said in a statement.
About 3,500 people attended a rally in West Allis on Tuesday, where Harris stressed the important role that the battleground state of Wisconsin played in her election. It was the largest rally of the 2024 presidential election, including any events hosted by Biden, White said.
Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at West Allis Central High School in West Allis, Wisconsin, Tuesday, July 23, 2024. Angela Major/WPR
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Jariah Jefferson, a Milwaukee-based Democratic organizer, said her team has seen increased interest on the ground, including from new faces coming into local offices for the first time this election cycle.
“After the chaos, we had a lot of people come into our office unprompted, wanting yard signs, signing up to volunteer, or finding out how they could get involved,” she said. “We even had people calling us who had previously said they wanted to wait until closer to the election to volunteer.”
That enthusiasm appears to be reflected in donations: A spokesman for the Wisconsin Democratic Party said the party has raised about $400,000 online since Sunday.
Harris’ national campaign raised $126 million between Sunday and Wednesday, including $81 million in the first 24 hours after Biden’s announcement, according to her campaign.
Joe Zepecki, a Milwaukee-based Democratic political consultant, said Ms Harris’ entry into the race marks a “complete change in the atmosphere” of the race.
“The change in enthusiasm is palpable,” said Zepecki, who worked on the 2012 Wisconsin campaigns for former President Barack Obama and then-Vice President Joe Biden. “You can literally feel it in the air.”
Zepecki said Democrats had previously supported the incumbent Biden, but “there was some doubt and concern about the future of the country and real uncertainty about whether Biden could rise to the occasion and stop Donald Trump from losing the presidency again.”
“So, psychologically, I think the transition to Harris has been really liberating and people feel like a little bit of a burden has been lifted,” he said.
Wisconsin Republican Party spokesman Matt Fischer said Republicans are also riding a new wave of enthusiasm after the Republican National Convention wrapped up in Milwaukee last week.
“We certainly experienced a real increase in engagement and real positivity in terms of interest and people participating,” Fischer said. “I think we left the convention having mobilized and energized the party in a way that we haven’t seen in a long time.”
Former President Donald Trump’s campaign also faced a fundraising storm following his conviction in a New York court last month on hush-money charges and Biden’s underwhelming debate performance.
More recently, Harris’ campaign has been fundraising after an assassination attempt on her ahead of the Republican National Convention. The Wisconsin Republican Party is also now trying to use Harris’ late entry into the race to argue that her path to the race was flawed and that she is a fresh face on the same Democratic platform that Biden has promoted.
“The honeymoon of enthusiasm that emerged on the Democratic side is going to quickly run into this cold brick wall of political reality,” Fischer said. “You can relabel the bottle, but it’s the same rotten product.”
Listen to the WPR report
Wisconsin Democrats have been revitalized since the Biden-Harris transition to the White House, Wisconsin Public Radio reported.
