CHICAGO — The Democratic National Convention's second night highlighted the party's past presidents, particularly Chicago's own Barack Obama. The Democrats also went all-in on promoting cross-party appeal, featuring a former Donald Trump spokeswoman and a Republican mayor from the battleground state of Arizona.
Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, ducked out of Chicago to hold a rally just up the interstate in Milwaukee, wooing voters in swing state Wisconsin. It's a recognition that, regardless of whatever good vibes may exist at the convention, Democrats expect this presidential election to be razor-close.
Here are some takeaways from the convention's second night.
The ex-presidents club
If the Republican convention was all about Trump, the Democrats on Tuesday wanted to put Harris in a pantheon with past presidents. It wasn’t just Obama who was to make the case for the vice president. The convention turned to the grandsons of Jimmy Carter and John F. Kennedy to also portray her as the natural heir of past Democratic leaders.
As groundbreaking as Harris' candidacy is as the first woman of color to be her party’s nominee, these speeches by an ex-president and presidential progeny were all about linking her to a broader historical arc, creating a nostalgic message that can animate an increasingly older electorate.
“Kamala Harris carries my grandfather’s legacy,” said Jason Carter, the grandson of the 39th president. “She knows what is right and she fights for it.”
Jack Schlossberg suggested that Harris would carry forward the agenda of Kennedy.
“She believes in America like my grandfather did," Schlossberg said. "That we do things not because they’re easy, but because they’re hard.”
A message for Republicans: It’s OK to Quit Trump
The Democrats are making a play for disaffected Trump voters — and they used one of his former White House staffers to make their case.
Stephanie Grisham worked in various roles in the Trump White House, including communications director and press secretary, allowing Democrats to argue that those who know Trump best have seen him at his worst.
“He has no empathy, no morals, and no fidelity to the truth,” Grisham said. “I couldn’t be part of the insanity any longer. When I was press secretary, I got skewered for never holding a White House briefing. It’s because unlike my boss. I never wanted to stand at that podium and lie.”
Kyle Sweetser, a Trump voter from Alabama, told the convention the former president’s tariffs made life harder for construction workers like him. Republican Mayor John Giles of Mesa, Arizona, also was to speak on Tuesday about why he’s backing Harris. Giles sees Trump’s policies as hurting cities like his.
A weighty prop to drive home the Democrats' message on Project 2025
Each day of the DNC is to feature a speaker brandishing an oversized tome designed to represent the Project 2025 policy book from the conservative Heritage Foundation.
Project 2025 is on one hand a very typical Washington effort, uniting a bunch of wonks and activists to map out a potential agenda for the next president. In this case, the authors include many officials who served in Trump’s administration and remain close to the candidate. Its organizers say they’ve gotten dozens of conservative groups to sign on to the push, making it far more meaningful than the average collection of policy papers.
Democrats use Project 2025 as shorthand for their warnings about what might transpire in a second Trump term, particularly potential revisions to civil service rules to ensure more of the federal workforce is loyal to the president. But it’s also got page after page of other proposals, grist for attacks from the convention podium.
On Tuesday, it was Pennsylvania state Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta’s turn to wave the big book. “It is a radical plan to drag us backwards,” he declared.
Michigan Sen. Gary Peters didn’t wield the prop, but name-checked the initiative.
“Their Project 2025 agenda is the same old, same old: gut overtime pay, cut healthcare programs and give billions and billions in tax breaks to billionaires,” Peters said of Republicans.