Former US President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama at the Democratic National Convention on Tuesday night urged Americans to support Kamala Harris in her 11-hour presidential contest against Republican Donald Trump, US media reported.
Obama has thrown his considerable political capital behind Harris, who is seeking to make history on November 5 as the first woman and the first black and South Asian person to be elected US president. Obama told delegates on Day Two of the Chicago convention:
“We do not need four more years of bluster and bumbling and chaos. We have seen that movie before, and we all know that the sequel is usually worse. America is ready for a new chapter. America is ready for a better story. We are ready for a President Kamala Harris.”
He lashed out at Trump, the Republican who succeeded him as president in 2017, and praised Joe Biden, his vice president, who was forced out of the 2024 race by Democratic allies who feared he would lose to Trump in November. Obama also added:
“History will remember Joe Biden as a president who defended democracy at a moment of great danger. I am proud to call him my president, but even prouder to call him my friend.”
“Yes, she can,” Obama said of Harris, prompting the boisterous crowd to repeatedly chant the phrase, recalling Obama’s own “Yes, we can” campaign slogan.
Obama was introduced by his wife Michelle, who tops the Democrats’ wish list for a future president. Michelle Obama said, alluding to Obama’s first presidential campaign in 2008:
“America, hope is making a comeback.”
She warned that Trump would try to distort Harris’ truth, just as he has been doing “everything in his power to make people afraid of us.” She also added:
“His limited and narrow view of the world made him feel threatened by the existence of two hardworking, highly educated, successful people who also happened to be Black.”
Protests raged outside
A demonstration outside the Israeli consulate in Chicago briefly turned violent after a group of about 50 people separated from a larger protest and bumped into a police line. Several arrests were made.
Protesters on Tuesday chanted “Let them go!” as police handcuffed at least four people and led them away from the demonstration. Police with wooden batons shouted “let’s go” and corralled the demonstrators into the street, preventing them from passing.
Some demonstrators set fire to a US flag in the street as Vice President Kamala Harris’ holiday roll call was taking place at the United Centre, about 3.2km away. Others carried Palestinian flags, and many more wore black and covered their faces.
As the protesters regrouped and approached a line of riot police in riot gear in front of the Chicago skyscraper that houses the Israeli consulate, one officer said into a megaphone, “You are ordered to disperse immediately.”
A group unaffiliated with the coalition of more than 200 groups that organised Monday’s protests advertised Tuesday’s demonstration under the slogan “Make it Great Like “68,” referring to the protests against the Vietnam War that took over the city during the 1968 Democratic National Convention.
The atmosphere, with rows of riot police in riot gear, was in stark contrast to the fact that a day earlier thousands of pro-Palestinian activists, including families with babies in prams, had marched near the convention site calling for a ceasefire.
The consulate has been the site of numerous demonstrations since Israel launched its war on Gaza in October.
Supporters of Israel, including relatives of people captured by Hamas, gathered a day earlier at a pro-Israel art installation near the consulate to urge US leaders to continue to support Israel and push for the release of the hostages.
