In an Thursday afternoon statement that was an obvious preemptive strike at the Trump-Pence ticket and the republican Party who have not made one statement about the cause of unrest in cities around the country, Democratic Vice Presidential nominee Kamala Harris directly attacked the republican nominees for failing to recognize the racial injustice occurring in the United State.
“People are rightfully angry and exhausted,” Harris said, relating to both the racial inequities in the American justice system and the Trump administration.
Harris’s statement came on the day Trump will give his acceptance speech at the republican program that replaced the Party convention. The timing of her address will force the Trump camp to hurriedly rewrite Trump’s speech if it did not address the topics she raised, or else Trump will appear to be too frightened to address specific issues impacting the nation today.
Clearly, one of the issues Harris is forcing Trump to address is police abuse and racial injustice. Throughout the first three days of republican programming, no speaker has talked about the recent shootings of unarmed Black people like Beonna Taylor or Jacob Blake, or the murder of George Floyd. Their names have not been mentioned by republicans even as protests swept the country, including work stoppages by professional sports teams.
“We must always defend peaceful protests and peaceful protestors,” Harris stated while also condemning the violence and destruction of rioters using the cover of peaceful protests for mayhem. “We will not let these vigilantes and extremists derail our path to justice.”
Shifting the topic to the coronavirus, Harris pointed out that republicans are glossing over the real impact of the disease on American families and businesses while promoting false narratives about an imminent miracle cure.
“We cannot look the other way or become numb to the consequences of them,” Harris said. “We need to see and we need to hear what is happening in our country. The quiet desperation that has taken over so many,” focusing on the anxiety and fear people have, who must now rely on food banks and rental assistance to ensure stable households; parents teaching kids at home as schools close because of a mandated rush to reopen; health care professionals who are facing death on an unprecedented scale; and small business owners who fear shuttering their doors because the virus is not under control.
Harris targeted Trump’s inability to understand the concerns of working-class American families, particularly evident in the way he refocuses every conversation about himself and not the people he serves.
“He’s the president of the United States. It’s not supposed to be about him. It’s supposed to be about the health and safety of the American people,” Harris stated. “Donald Trump has failed at the most basic and important job of President of the United States: he failed to protect the American people.”
At a swipe at both Trump and Pence, who tout a cure in coming months even though scientists and medical professionals say one will not be available until at least 2021, she said “Trump tells us not to worry, that the virus would disappear, that, quote, ‘a miracle is coming,’… Trump doesn’t have a plan. He still doesn’t have a plan. Joe Biden released his plan in March.”
Harris expounded that Trump’s policy regarding the coronavirus is to make a statement and hope people believe you, but “you can’t stop a pandemic with a tweet.”
Harris outlined why Trump has been ineffective in actually dealing with the coronavirus. He was focused on other things, she explained:
- he was fixated on the stock market, worried that discussing the pandemic would hurt stock indices, which he views as one of the few accomplishments of his administration that could get him reelected.
- “At the moment we needed Trump to be tough on Chinese government,” Harri explained, “he caved.” She referred to a January 24th tweet in which Trump praised the Chinese for their transparency while, Harris noted, the Chinese government had blocked US CDC officials from getting information about the spread and infectiousness of the virus. “Trump stood idly by,” Harris commented.
- Trump desperately wanted to avoid responsibility, instead pushing the entire response to the coronavirus on governors and aides. On call to governors on March 16th, Harris detailed, Trump told governors it wasn’t his job to get equipment and supplies to treat patients. “Try getting it yourself,” he told them.
“The tragedy of all of this is, it didn’t have to be this bad,” Harris declared. “Look around. It’s not this bad in the rest of the world.”
Harris outlined Biden’s plan for dealing with the coronavirus, which he outlined at the Democratic National Convention, including making PPE and equipment here in the US, ensuring that American companies were geared up to manufacture needed medications, and unmuzzling medical professionals so the public can get trustworthy information.
To illustrate how poorly Trump has managed the government, Harris explained that the Trump Administration undermined federal ability to address a problem like coronavirus, including an Obama-era project, “PREDICT, a program to track emerging diseases in places like China. Trump cut it. Obama/Biden put a team in the National Security Council to respond to pandemic; Trump cut it. They created a team to monitor nursing homes to ensure safety and quality of care; Trump is cutting that now.”
Wrapping up, Harris implored people to “stop fanning the flames of hate and division, and start treating people with the respect they deserve. As Joe Biden said in his acceptance speech, we have a choice between the light and the dark. I believe America will choose the light.”