Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris fired up a group of Beaver County Democrats with a brief appearance on Sunday, part of a regional bus tour with running mate Tim Walz that played up several Western Pennsylvania cultural touchstones just before the Democratic National Convention.
In a speech that lasted only slightly more than five minutes, Harris told a tent full of supporters in Rochester that at stake was nothing less than the nature of democracy, which she described as both strong "when it is intact" but also "incredibly fragile."
"It is only as strong as our willingness to fight for it," she said. "And that's what this campaign is about."
Harris said that a "perversion" of democracy in recent years has led to a politics in which "the strength of a leader is based on who you beat down.
"What we know is that the real and true measure of the strength of a leader is who you lift up."
Harris' speech featured no policy specifics, but she did stress a focus on causes like ending child poverty, helping the middle class, and "freedom — whether it be to make decisions about your own body or love who you love."
"These are the things we stand for, and these therefore are the things we fight for," she said.
Walz, who previously coached high school football, took a somewhat less cerebral tack when discussing the restoration of politics. He recalled a time when Americans could spend Thanksgiving "watching a Steelers game with your relatives and not complain about politics all the time."
Drawing on his football experience, he said that "You don't hope you're going to win, you prepare to win... And when that game is over you want to know that you left it all in the field. And that's all we're asking."
Walz got to dust off his clipboard again a short time later when the bus tour stopped in Aliquippa, where they dropped in on a practice of the town's storied football team, the Quips. He emphasized that politics, like football, is a team sport, and thanked the team "for giving us the privilege to stand on this field."
Harris, for her part, told players they "all are the future of our country. ... Welcome to the role model club."
The entourage also visited an Aliquippa firehouse where Harris delivered a pair of burnt almond torts from Prantl's, a legendarily popular dessert in Pittsburgh.
It's not unusual for a visiting politician to make a stop at local landmarks, but the Harris/Walz campaign's commitment to the bit was notable. And when the group went to a Sheetz, the moment was documented in real time by CNN.
"It looks like the vice president is getting a bag of Doritos," said reporter Jeff Zeleny. "It looks to me like a Wawa."
Zeleny was quickly corrected on-air.
In an exchange with reporters outside a Primanti's, no less, Harris summed up the approach to the day — and what she said would be her approach to the campaign.
While polls showed her gaining ground over Donald Trump, she said, "I very much consider us the underdog." The strategy, she said, would be "to earn everyone's vote. and that means being on the road, being in communities where people are, where they live. Whether it be a high-school football team and being there at their public school ... Whether it means going to a local fire station and talking with our incredible firefighters about what they need."
Harris also briefly addressed some policy questions as well. Asked how she would pay for initiatives like a tax credit on first-time home purchases, she said "there's a great return on investment," when families buy homes and contribute to the tax base.
As for whether she thought Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu would move ahead with a ceasefire to halt the war in Gaza, Harris said she "will not speak for him" but added, "We are not giving up ... We gotta get a ceasefire and we gotta get those hostages out."
Just prior to their Rochester appearance, Walz and Harris joined a phone bank in a field office adjacent to the speech site, where they engaged with voters on the other end of the line. "I love Erie," Harris said to one, promising to visit there "at some point."
Closer to home, Democrats had gathered on the streets of Rochester hours before Harris and Walz were scheduled to appear in the Beaver County borough Sunday afternoon.
And many said that having Harris take over from Joe Biden as the nominee had transformed the race, infusing it with an enthusiasm they hadn't felt since Barack Obama captured the party's imagination, and the White House, in 2008.
"I supported Joe, but I think the change has given new life to the campaign," said Molly Romigh, of Beaver Falls, who was standing along Adams Street before lunchtime.
Harris has been a repeat visitor to Western Pennsylvania in her capacity as vice president, and both she and Walz were joined by their spouses, Douglas Emhoff and Gwen Walz, on Sunday. It was the first time the two couples campaigned publicly together. Supporters say that the ticket was well-suited to speak to the concerns of the moment.
Since a Supreme Court majority led by Trump appointees overturned the constitutional right to an abortion, Romigh said, "I think women see they need a better voice" than they were going to get from the Republican ticket. "I think they understand what it would mean to have a man in the White House who is going to take their rights away."
When Biden was heading up the ticket, "I don't want to say I was depressed, but I wasn't looking forward to the election," said Kimberly Foster, also of Beaver Falls. "I didn't feel Biden would get the support he needed because of his age."
But "when he stepped down and she stepped up, it was like a new life for the campaign," she said.
Not everyone was a fan: Trump supporters held a demonstration, waving "Trump 2024" posters outside a BBQ restaurant across the street from the Harris event. Amd a pair of pick-up trucks bearing Trump flags and a vulgar reference to Biden could be seen circling the area, driving down Adams Street.
"It's just sad," said Center Township resident Jody Bell as she watched the trucks drive past. She said she had been an ardent Biden supporter because "he is a good and decent person."
"I cried, and I got over it," when Biden withdrew from the campaign, she said. "But I cried."
Prior to Harris and Walz 's arrival, a gathering of volunteers and local elected officials heard from two other Democrats whose names will be appearing below the presidential ticket: state Attorney General hopeful Eugene DePasquale and Auditor General candidate Malcolm Kenyatta. They spoke about the importance of face-to-face campaigning, and the stakes if Democrats lose the presidency.
DePasquale, for one, noted that the GOP would seek to overturn the Affordable Care Act, which protects insurance access for people with pre-existing conditions.
"I know some people call them weird, but here in Western Pennsylvania, we call them jagoffs," he said.
Other speakers included Chris Deluzio and US Senator Bob Casey, both of whom are up for re-election.
"Every Republican running this year ... wants to repeal that bill, the bill that will lower prescription drug costs."
"You're damn right, 'boo,'" said Casey when the crowd jeered at the GOP.
The Rochester stop was part of a tour that began when Harris and Walz arrived at Pittsburgh International Airport to unveil a new campaign bus. They were set to tour other sites in Western Pennsylvania throughout the afternoon before departing from the airport Sunday evening for Chicago, the site of this week’s Democratic National Convention.
The choice of Rochester carried some symbolic importance, underscoring Democrats’ plans to make their case in the kind of white working-class communities that have provided Donald Trump with his staunchest base of support since 2016.
While the collapse of Big Steel hit Beaver County hard, it retains a higher-than-average manufacturing sector. Just a 10-minute drive down the road from Rochester is Shell’s “cracker plant,” hailed as the largest industrial facility to be built in the area for a generation and a spinoff benefit of the region’s natural gas industry — even as questions mount about its environmental record and economic impact.
Trump won the county that year and in 2020 by margins of roughly 58 to 40 (and visited the cracker site in a campaign stop thinly veiled as a White House visit in 2019). But in 2022 county voters split their support, supporting Democrat Josh Shapiro for governor and Mehmet Oz for Senate. And the selection of Walz, a plain-speaking hunting enthusiast, as Harris’ running mate is just one sign that the ticket plans to continue Joe Biden’s efforts to connect with working-class white people. Harris and Walz have also courted union members — a key part of Biden’s winning 2020 constituency — while embracing a populist economic message.
In recent days, Democrats have touted legislative wins that will allow the government to negotiate some pharmaceutical costs for Medicare beneficiaries. In a recently unveiled economic plan, Harris has pledged to encourage more housing construction and to fight inflation in grocery prices, which she contends stems from price gouging by the increasingly consolidated meatpacking industry. (Economists are divided on how large a role such business tactics have played in price spikes, noting that COVID-era supply chain disruptions have played a significant part in driving up inflation rates that only recently have begun to ease.)
Democrats "understand our county is purple now, and they are going to fight for every vote they can get out here. And rightfully so," said Democratic Beaver County Commissioner Tony Amadio, who was on hand for the event. He said that voters in the county "want to hear what she's going to do for people. They are concerned about Medicare and Social Security."
The visit to Western Pennsylvania comes as polling trends and the dynamics of the race itself have been overturned by Harris’ replacement of President Joe Biden at the top of the Democratic ticket. After Biden’s disastrous debate performance earlier this summer, polls showed him lagging behind Trump among Pennsylvania voters. More recent polling, however, has shown Harris with a lead hovering on the margin of error.
Most political prognosticators say that Harris’ fortunes especially depend upon winning Pennsylvania. But the stakes here for both campaigns are high, and Trump himself made a visit to the eastern part of the state on Saturday. During a speech in Wilkes-Barre, he made a characteristically kitchen-sink case against Harris, mixing criticism of her policies and vague policy promises with asides that delved into personal insults and the assertion that “I am much better looking” than the nominee.
Trump will be back in the state Monday, for an appearance in York. And on Sunday the Democrats made clear they'd be back as well.
"Gosh, I really like Pennsylvania," said Gwen Walz during a speech of her own. "I think I might want to spend a lot of time here."
