The Democratic National Convention began on Monday in Chicago, with roughly 50,000 people expected to arrive in the Windy City. That includes thousands of anti-war activists demonstrating near the United Center.
President Joe Biden is the headline speaker for the first evening. Later this week, Vice President Kamala Harris will officially accept the party’s nomination.
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Senator Schumer says he received ‘hundreds’ of calls saying Biden should step down
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said that he received calls from “hundreds” of people telling him that Joe Biden should step down after the presidential debate in June.
“I thought we ought to do it privately if people wanted to do it,” Schumer said at a Politico event about Democrats’ calls for him to step down. “I thought it would be both more effective and more honorable.”
Union leaders line up behind Harris
Democrats want to show voters that they’re with workers, drawing on labor union support for the opening night of the convention.
“We are all in for Kamala Harris because Kamala Harris has always been all in for us,” said April Verrett, president of the Service Employees International Union, or SEIU.
Verrett was among the group of union leaders who took to the stage to counter the courting of blue-collar workers by Trump, who invited the head of the Teamsters to speak at the Republican National Convention. Teamsters President Sean O’Brien was not among the union leaders speaking at the Democratic convention on Monday.
The crowd waved “UNION YES!” signs as the leaders spoke. Most union households have backed Democrats, helping the party win in key states such as Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin in 2020.
Liz Shuler, head of the AFL-CIO, said that Trump’s plans were “a CEO’s dream, but a worker’s nightmare.”
Rep. Robert Garcia shares his family’s immigration story
California Rep. Robert Garcia delivered his family story of immigrating to the U.S. and becoming a citizen, seeking to paint a different vision of patriotism to that touted by the GOP.
“I am a proud immigrant who came to the United States as a young child. We grew up poor, English was our second language and we often, like many immigrant families, struggled to get by,” Garcia said.
Garcia called the day he became a citizen “the proudest day of my life.” He recounted his upbringing, which was at times characterized by hardship.
FACT CHECK: Trump, COVID-19 and bleach injections
Rep. Robert Garcia, of California, claimed that former President Trump “told us to inject bleach into our bodies” during the COVID-19 pandemic.
That’s an overstatement. Rather, Trump asked whether it would be possible to inject disinfectant into the lungs.
“And then I see the disinfectant, where it knocks it out in one minute,” he said at an April 2020 press conference. “And is there a way we can do something like that, by injection inside or almost a cleaning, because you see it gets in the lungs and it does a tremendous number on the lungs, so it’d be interesting to check that, so that you’re going to have to use medical doctors with, but it sounds interesting to me. So, we’ll see, but the whole concept of the light, the way it kills it in one minute. That’s pretty powerful.”
Democrats want to remind voters that the COVID-19 pandemic began during Trump’s presidency
It’s been four years since the pandemic shut down the United States — and Democrats are trying to tie the crisis to Trump’s presidency.
The convention showed a video montage of Trump commenting on the coronavirus pandemic as president, as the hall echoed with boos. It included a separate video featuring Rich Logis, a former Trump voter who rejected Trump over his handling of the pandemic. The Democrats noted that the economy recovered under President Biden as vaccinations allowed offices, schools and public spaces to reopen.
“He took the COVID crisis and turned it into a catastrophe,” said Rep. Lauren Underwood, Democratic of Illinois. “We can never let him be our president again.”
Last month’s Republican convention largely eschewed mention of the pandemic, framing Trump’s presidency as a period of prosperity that was subsequently undone by the Biden administration.
Peggy Flanagan could be the first Native woman governor — if Harris is elected
The Democratic convention’s co-chair, Minnesota’s Lieutenant Governor Peggy Flanagan, could soon make history as the first Native woman to govern a state. The prospect led to cheers among the crowd, as it would depend on Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz winning the vice presidency as Kamala Harris’ running mate.
Flanagan is a citizen of the White Earth Band of Ojibwe.
She focused her remarks on electing Harris and Walz, saying, “He and Harris have spent their lives fighting for you, for your family, for your future.”
Who’s speaking tonight?
Biden has the top billing Monday night, but there are other big names on the speakers list.
Also expected is Hillary Clinton, who was her party’s first woman nominee in 2016. Harris is the second.
Rep. Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, one of Biden’s top congressional allies is also expected, as is New York Gov. Kathy Hochul.
Another name of note among Monday night’s speakers is Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a progressive Democrat in the House who was supportive of Sanders’ candidacy in 2020 but has since backed Biden, even arguing against him departing the race earlier this year.
Who is Fannie Lou Hamer?
Multiple speakers have mentioned Fannie Lou Hamer, a civil rights activist who gave a landmark speech at the Democratic Convention in 1964.
Hamer was a former sharecropper and a leader of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, a racially integrated group that challenged the seating of an all-white Mississippi delegation at the 1964 DNC.
Her televised testimony to the credentials committee in Atlantic City, New Jersey, mesmerized the nation and shone light on the violence inflicted on Hamer and others as they worked to secure rights that were supposed to be guaranteed by the Constitution.
Hamer spoke on Aug. 22, 1964 — exactly 60 years before Kamala Harris is scheduled to accept the Democratic nomination and become the first Black woman and first person of South Asian descent to be the presidential nominee of a major party.
Sen. Sanders defends his support for Biden’s presidential candidacy
Sen. Bernie Sanders, who stood by President Biden over the summer even as many Democrats called for him to step aside, defended his support for the president at a Politico event Monday.
“Did I think (Biden) was a great campaigner? No. But I think he was an excellent president,” the Vermont lawmaker said.
He added that while Vice President Harris is “not his best friend,” he sees his former colleague as a strong campaigner and the “potential to be an excellent president.”
Civil rights leader Jesse Jackson honored
The opening of the Democratic convention recognized Jesse Jackson, the civil rights activist and Democratic presidential candidate in 1984 and 1988.
Jackson, 82, entered the stage in a wheelchair, holding up both thumbs up in triumph to a cheering crowd. The ordained Baptist pastor did not speak to the convention.
Multiple speakers gave shoutouts to Jackson, who was also the subject of a video broadcast at the event’s hall. The video noted that Vice President Harris was “standing on the shoulder of giants” such as Jackson.
Both the Democratic and Republican national conventions recognized America’s native peoples
Both the DNC and RNC included what’s known as a “land acknowledgment” that recognized the stewardship of the land by indigenous peoples and tribes.
At the Democratic convention in Chicago, the acknowledgment was delivered by Zach Pahmahmie and Lorrie Melchior, who are both part of the tribal council of the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation.
At the Republican convention last month in Milwaukee, James Crawford of the Forest County Potawatomi Executive Council gave the land acknowledgment.
Party activists held a forum on the plight of the Palestinian people
With Vice President Harris now leading the party, there are some indicators at the DNC that Harris is taking assertive steps to ease the tension between the party and the protest movement in support of the Palestinian people.
In what organizers called a first, party activists were given space at the convention to hold a forum to discuss the plight of the Palestinian people, who have been under Israeli bombardment for months, as well as share deeply personal — and often heartrending stories — about family members lost in the conflict.
Though their core demands — a dramatic change in U.S. foreign policy over the war — remain unmet, the decision to allow activists to hold a forum amounted to the offering of an olive branch by Harris. And it’s one that many doubted Biden would have extended if he were still the nominee.
James Zogby, a panelist and the founder of the Arab American Institute, acknowledged that there was still discontent over the Democratic Party’s handling of the war in Gaza. But he said the forum was nonetheless a first.
Night 1 of the DNC has begun
The Democratic National Convention has started with delegates still filtering into Chicago’s United Center.
The gathering opened with remarks shortly after 6:30 p.m. central time by Minyon Moore, chair of the convention committee. Moore called President Biden, the evening’s main speaker, a true patriot.
Jaime Harrison, the chair of the Democratic National Committee, noted to applause the historical moment in that he and Moore are both Black, as is the party’s nominee, Vice President Harris.
Several protesters have been detained
A group of several dozen activists, who had separated from a larger march advocating for a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas conflict, were removed from a restricted area by police, including those led by Superintendent Larry Snelling.
Police wearing helmets with masks attached formed a line along a fence, which had been previously breached and still had several panels missing, while some activists shouted at them. Several protesters who had managed to get through the fence were detained and handcuffed by the police.
‘When this over, the work begins’
Johnson of the NAACP expressed concern at rhetoric from former President Trump and other Republicans calling into question the security or legitimacy of the country’s election security, noting that the attacks are often aimed at election systems serving communities of color.
“If there are legitimate concerns around election integrity, let’s address them,” Johnson said. “But to continue to repeat something that is neither factual or misleading is only furthering the goal of eroding trust in the system, and that’s a strategy.”
Campbell from the NCBCP believes that the energy, which she found especially pronounced among young activists, was only the start of a broader engagement effort for communities of color.
“When this over, the work begins,” Campbell said.
Civil rights leaders praise ‘high energy’ while awaiting concrete policy steps during DNC
Civil rights leaders speaking at the DNC’s first night are expecting to hear concrete plans for racial and economic justice from their fellow speakers from the podium this week.
“I will be listening to determine whether they are speaking to the needs and interests of African American communities across this country,” said Derrick Johnson, president of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
“I’ll be expecting her to lay out the foundation for where she will want to take the country,” said Melanie Campbell, CEO of the National Coalition on Black Civic Participation, a civil rights group that works to enfranchise Black Americans.
Johnson and Campbell are both speaking tonight. Campbell noted that the event has had “a high level of energy,” largely drawn from renewed optimism among liberals and progressives at the ascension of Vice President Harris.
“It was not something we were expecting. It is a humbling moment we are witnessing. Our ancestors’ wildest dreams,” said Campbell.
Campbell, who called on Biden to select a Black woman as his vice president during the 2020 election, said she had always been sure that Harris was prepared to serve from the Oval Office. “We knew she had to be ready to be president, as with any previous vice president,” Campbell said of her and her allies thinking in 2020.
‘The whole world is watching’
Dozens of activists chanting, “End the occupation now,” are facing off with police just a few blocks from the United Center. As tensions rose, many officers put on gas masks, and the situation intensified when some activists tried to bring down a second fence set up in front of the police.
Some protesters began chanting, “The whole world is watching!” just as anti-Vietnam War protesters did in 1968 when police clashed with protesters on live television.
Demonstrators break through fence
Dozens of activists taking part in the Coalition to March on the DNC broke through a fence set up outside the United Center.
The fence lining Park 578 was torn down as protesters broke through. A second fence was in place in front of dozens of police officers. Activists banged on the fence in front of officers, who yelled at them not to touch it.
Harris campaign manager says more policy proposals are forthcoming
The Harris campaign’s principal deputy manager, Quentin Fulks, pushed back against criticism that the vice president hasn’t shared many policy proposals since launching her campaign about a month ago.
Onstage at the CNN-Politico Grill at the convention, he pointed to her proposals to give $25,000 in down payment help to first-time homebuyers, to expand the child tax credit and to build more affordable housing units.
“I think that she has rolled out policy and I think any qualms with sort of what’s on the website is just a matter of literally switching the top of the ticket in a presidential campaign,” he said.
“You’re going to continue to see more policy proposals from her. But the important thing is that the vice president isn’t just saying things to get votes. These policies are being developed based on her worldviews, her values, her vision set. And so, it’s really important to her that she gets it right.”
Michigan senator believes authenticity will help Harris win the Great Lake state
Michigan Sen. Gary Peters, the chair of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, said that Harris’ authenticity will be key to her winning his state this fall.
“We’re a midwestern state, people like to know folks are speaking from the heart,” the Michigan Democrat said onstage at the conventions CNN-Politico Grill. “She needs to show how she cares, which she does. I know that.”
Peters said he’s seen a surge of enthusiasm and energy among Democratic voters who had been looking for a fresh face with new ideas.
But he said he’s looking forward to honoring Biden’s decades of public service in Monday’s evening programming, lauding the president as a “man of incredible character.”
“Just imagine that. A president that puts himself second to what’s good for the country,” Peters said of Biden. “I can think of a recent president that probably that wouldn’t apply to.”
Peters was optimistic about battleground state Senate races in this fall’s election, saying Democrats are running strong candidates against flawed Republicans.
Thousands of protestors march outside DNC
Several thousand protesters marched in the demonstration snaking through residential areas around the United Center, but the numbers fell short of the “tens of thousands” organizers had predicted in their legal battle for a longer route. “We’re proud of the turnout, especially considering the degree of the repression from the city,” said organizer Faayani Aboma Mijana.
Police presence was heavy along the march route but organizers of the march also provided their own marshals to provide security, hand out water bottles and keep people on the city-approved route.
Among the sea of delegates, an ‘honest weirdo’
Long before the Democrats started using the “weird” label for Republican policies and statements, one DNC delegate has been describing himself as an “honest weirdo.”
