Less than 36 hours after President Biden ended his re-election campaign and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris to succeed him as the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee, Harris announced that she’d locked up the nomination.
“I am proud to have earned the support needed to become our party’s nominee,” the vice president wrote in a social media post just after midnight early Tuesday morning.
Harris showcased that she’d won commitments of backing from a majority of the nearly 4,000 delegates to next month’s Democratic National Convention, which kicks off Aug. 19 in Chicago.
As much of the Democratic Party – including governors, senators and House members as well as party leaders – quickly coalesced behind Harris following Biden’s blockbuster news, state delegations to the convention started huddling the past two days and announced their support for the vice president. And an Associated Press survey of Democratic delegates indicated by late Monday that Harris had gone over the top.
“As a daughter of California, I am proud that my home state’s delegation helped put our campaign over the top,” Harris said in her statement.
Harris’ clinching of the nomination will likely become official within the next two weeks, as the Democratic National Committee moves forward with a virtual presidential nomination roll call of the delegates.
HARRIS GOES OVER THE TOP IN SECURING THE DEMOCRATIC NOMINATION
The DNC’s Rules Committee meets Wednesday to approve how the roll call will play out. But a draft of the proposed plan – in a memo obtained on Monday night by Fox News – indicates the voting will be completed before Aug. 7, 12 days before the start of the convention.
“We are living through an unprecedented moment in history and, as a party, we are tackling it with the seriousness that it deserves,” DNC chair Jaimie Harrison said on a conference call with reporters. “We are prepared to undertake a transparent, swift and orderly process to move forward as a united Democratic Party with a nominee who represents our values.”
Vice President Kamala Harris speaks from the South Lawn of the White House, Monday, July 22, 2024, during an event with NCAA college athletes. It was her first public appearance since President Biden endorsed her to be the Democrats’ presidential nominee. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)
And pushing back against criticism from former President Trump’s campaign and other Republicans that the Democrats are ignoring the will of their voters by quickly nominating Harris to replace Biden as the party’s standard-bearer, Harrison argued that Democrats “can, and will, be both fast and fair as we execute this nomination.”
The DNC said the vice president, as well as any other candidate who qualifies for the roll call, would have a few days to court delegates for support before the virtual voting starts, which could come as early as next week.
But the announcement by Harris a few hours later that she had secured enough delegates to lock up the nomination – as well as the continued endorsements of her from across the party – seemed to put to rest any possibility someone else would seriously challenge her for the nomination.
VICE PRESIDENT RAKES IN A STAGGERING HAUL SINCE BIDEN DROPPED OUT
As Harris locks up the nomination, she’s also hauling in a staggering amount of campaign cash.
The Harris campaign announced on Tuesday morning that the vice president had hauled in more than $100 million in fundraising since Biden dropped out of the race and endorsed his vice president on Sunday afternoon.
The campaign spotlighted that the fundraising came from more than 1.1 million unique donors, with 62% of them being first-time contributors to the campaign.
Separate from the fundraising, the vetting process for a Harris running mate is also underway, a source familiar with the campaign’s thinking confirmed to Fox News.
President Biden walks down the steps of Air Force One at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, Wednesday, July 17, 2024. (Susan Walsh/AP)
Meanwhile, Harris heads out on the campaign trail on Tuesday for the first time since Biden suspended his bid.
The vice president heads to Milwaukee, the largest city and top Democratic bastion in the crucial Midwestern battleground state of Wisconsin, in a trip that was initially planned on Friday.
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The stop by Harris in Milwaukee comes five days after Trump gave his presidential nomination acceptance speech in the city’s Fiserv Forum, where the four-day Republican National Convention was held.
Harris made her first foray on the campaign trail on Monday, as she stopped by the Biden – now Harris – campaign headquarters in Wilmington, Delaware, to rally the troops.
Former President Trump, speaks during the final day of the Republican National Convention, Thursday, July 18, 2024, in Milwaukee. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)
In a tease of her argument against Trump, Harris took aim at the GOP presidential nominee.
“As many of you know, before I was elected as vice president, before I was elected as United States senator, I was the elected attorney general of California. Before that, I was a courtroom prosecutor. In those roles I took on perpetrators of all kinds,” Harris said.
“Predators who abused women, fraudsters who ripped off consumers, cheaters who broke the rules for their own gain. So hear me when I say, I know Donald Trump’s type,” she emphasized as she pointed to Trump’s multiple lawsuits and criminal cases, many of which are ongoing.
Trump, in a slew of posts the past two days on his Truth Social platform, has been slamming Harris.
Among other things, the former president called her “Dumb as a Rock” and “a totally failed and insignificant Vice President.”