EAU CLAIRE, Wis. (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris declared herself and her new running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, “joyful warriors” against Donald Trump on Wednesday as they spent their first full day campaigning together across the Midwest. They got an unusual glimpse of how hotly contested the region will be when they overlapped on a Wisconsin tarmac with Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance. The Democrats visited Wisconsin and Michigan, hoping to shore up support among the younger, diverse, labor-friendly voters who were instrumental in helping President Joe Biden win the 2020 election. Harris told the day’s first rally in Eau Claire, “As Tim Walz likes to point out, we are joyful warriors.” Contributing to that feeling, the Harris campaign said it had raised $36 million in the first 24 hours after she announced Walz as her running mate. The vice president said the pair look on the future with optimism, unlike former President Donald Trump whom she accused of being stuck in the past and preferring a confrontational style of politics — even as she criticized her opponent herself. “Someone who suggests we should terminate the Constitution of the United States should never again have the chance to sit behind the seal of the United States,” Harris said, her voice rising amid applause from a crowd her campaign said numbered more than 12,000. Wednesday’s campaign swing was especially important for her and Walz since Biden’s winning coalition from four years ago has showed signs of fraying over the summer — particularly in Michigan, which has emerged as a focal point of Democratic divisions over Biden’s handling of the Israel-Hamas conflict. With Biden now out of the race, leaders of the Arab American community and key unions say they are encouraged by the running mate choice. Walz’s addition to the ticket has soothed some tensions, signaling to some leaders that Harris had heard concerns about another leading contender for the vice presidential slot, Gov. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, who they felt had gone too far in his support for Israel. “The party is recognizing that there’s a coalition they have to rebuild,” said Abdullah Hammoud, the mayor of Dearborn, Michigan. “Picking Walz is another sign of good faith.” Trump, too, has put emphasis on appealing to voters in Midwestern states with his choice of Vance an Ohio Republican senator, as his running mate. Vance was even bracketing the Harris-Walz ticket with Michigan and Wisconsin appearances of his own on Wednesday. The dueling schedules overlapped enough that while Harris was still greeting a group of Girl Scouts who came to see her arrive at Chippewa Valley Regional Airport in Wisconsin, Vance’s campaign plane landed nearby and was taxiing in the distance. Harris posed for a group picture with the girls around the same time Vance was deplaning, and he began walking over to Air Force Two, trailed by his security detail. The vice president eventually climbed into her motorcade, and it pulled away before they could interact. Still, that the pair came so close to doing so on a tarmac was unusual given the carefully scripted nature of campaign schedules.
