Harris for President
To: Interested Parties
From: Harris-Walz Campaign Chair Jen O’Malley Dillon
Date: September 1, 2024
Subject: The State of the Race 65 Days Out
Vice President
Harris is running for the future and to turn the page on
the division of Donald Trump - and Americans are
energized behind that message. Since Vice President
Harris entered the race in late July, our campaign has
seen record fundraising numbers, a surge in
volunteer interest, and a spike in
enthusiasm to participate in this November’s election.
However, make no mistake: we head into the final stretch of this race as the clear underdogs. Donald Trump has a motivated base of support, with more support and higher favorability than he has had at any point since 2020. In just a few short days, Vice President Harris will face Trump on the debate stage, where we expect him to be a formidable opponent. In 2020, the election came down to about 40,000 votes across the battleground states. This November, we anticipate margins to be similarly razor-thin.
The difference maker will be which campaign has the candidate, the infrastructure, and the grit capable of expanding their support to build the type of broad, diverse coalition that wins elections. Every day, Vice President Harris proves she is that candidate.
Vice President Harris is running on a popular agenda that matters to voters at the ballot box. Trump will have to answer for Project 2025.
Vice President Harris comes to the job of president as someone acutely focused on the issues that matter to voters most when they get home from work at night. She grew up in a middle-class household and her agenda reflects those values: a plan to cut taxes for the middle class, lower grocery costs, and make housing more affordable for every American. Her economic vision is both good for the country and popular with the voters who will decide this election: Vice President Harris’ plans are pragmatic and focused on solutions, while a clear majority of swing voters see Trump as more extreme. They also prefer a candidate who is “honest,” and “fights for the working class,” — key elements of Vice President Harris’ pitch to voters this fall.
Vice President Harris is also running on one of the most galvanizing issues in recent elections: restoring reproductive freedom. Voters identified reproductive rights as a top issue influencing their vote in the 2022 midterm elections: In CNN’s 2022 pre-election poll, nearly three-quarters of voters called abortion very important to their vote, and a majority of voters called it extremely important. This trend continues in 2024, where 76% of voters have identified abortion as an important issue in this election, and nearly half of voters ranked it as very important. Vice President Harris’ steadfast support for reproductive rights and her clear-cut messaging on restoring the protections of Roe is a powerful piece of how this campaign will expand our coalition and path to victory.
Recent polls show Vice President Harris has room to expand her support with voters, as she makes significant inroads with voters and holds leads on core issues like crime (+1), democracy (+5), abortion (+17), health care (+7), gun violence (+5) and gaining and even leading (+1) on the economy, an issue where Republicans often hold large leads.
Meanwhile, Trump is burdened with defending the indefensible: Project 2025. New polling shows that voters are strongly aware of Trump’s extreme Project 2025 and the more they learn, the more they oppose it. And no matter how hard he tries to separate himself from Project 2025 and its litany of unpopular proposals (cutting Social Security, defunding K-12 education, and instituting a nationwide abortion ban to name a few), Trump won’t be able to shake his ties to Project 2025 thanks to our team’s aggressive efforts online and through paid media to cast a spotlight on Trump’s connection to Project 2025 for every day between now and Election Day.
Elections are a choice, and the choice between turning the page toward the future with Vice President Harris or going backwards with Trump will be on full display at the September 10 presidential debate. With hundreds of millions of dollars in paid media creative already lifting up Trump’s extreme and losing agenda, the debate will be another opportunity for us to break through and showcase the two very contrasting visions for the future of our country.
In an election
that will be decided in the states, ground game
matters more than ever.
Since Vice President
Harris became the nominee, we have seen tremendous
momentum and gains across every battleground. We maintain multiple pathways
to 270 electoral votes, and are growing strength
across the types of voters who decide elections in
every battleground. However, the race remains very
close, and will be decided by a small number of
undecided voters. That universe of voters does not like
Donald Trump, but needs to hear relentlessly from us
about Vice President Harris and her vision for the
country. That’s what makes our operational strength so
critical.
Heading into the final stretch, our operational strength matters more than ever. Since Vice President Harris entered the race, she’s raised more than $540 million - a historic sum. That money is going directly to a relentless battleground operation, with more than 312 coordinated offices and 2,000 coordinated staff in the states – a reflection of a campaign with presences in every corner of every battleground state and with the communities critical to victory. During a recent Weekend of Action, more than 10,000 volunteers made nearly 900,000 calls and knocked on 150,000 doors, contacting more than 1 million voters.
-
In the battlegrounds, we are working to persuade moderate and Republican voters, and cut Trump’s margins in rural areas and red counties. We have offices in rural counties like Washington and Jenkins in Georgia, Union and Jefferson in Pennsylvania, Jackson and Wilson in North Carolina, and Waushara and Rusk in Wisconsin.
-
Recently, we launched the Latinos con Harris-Walz WhatsApp channel, a first-of-its-kind effort to reach Latinos on the election in a place where many get their news from.
-
Team Harriz-Walz is bolstering its efforts to reach Black voters by continuing to partner with community and faith leaders across battleground states to host events within the communities that will decide this election – including during the upcoming HBCU homecoming season.
-
Last week, we announced a ramp up of efforts on hundreds of college campuses to engage students.
-
And just this Tuesday, we will launch our “Fight for Our Reproductive Freedoms” bus tour – an effort that will last until Election Day to drive home the threat Trump poses to women’s reproductive rights.
On the airwaves, we
are ceding no ground: through a landmark $370
million investment on digital and television
advertising between Labor Day and Election Day, the
Vice President will be making the case everywhere to
battleground voters on the issues that matter most to
them – all the
while Team Trump has reserved virtually zero media
reservations for the long-term.
In an election
that will be decided on the margins, Trump’s campaign
still lags far
behind in the infrastructure needed to win in key
battleground states. In Nevada,
Team Harris has 14 offices and more than 100 full-time
employees, while Trump has just five offices and
about 24 staff. In Pennsylvania, we have 50 coordinated
offices while Trump’s campaign trails and won’t say where they are located. In Georgia, we have 24 offices
while the Trump team didn’t open their first until
June.
And while we go on offense to expand our map, the Trump
team is on its back foot. In states like North Carolina and Georgia, Team Trump is being forced to
spend in ways they did not plan to originally.
The Road Ahead:
While Donald Trump
is a heavily defined candidate, voters do not know Vice
President Harris or Governor Walz as well. While we
continue to ramp up our organizing and paid efforts,
over this final stretch, an aggressive campaigning
schedule to introduce and define our ticket to the
voters that will decide this election will be critical.
From Labor Day
through November 5, Vice President Harris, Governor
Walz, and our army of trusted, mobilizing surrogates
are hitting the road to do the work to win every
single vote. The campaign plans to ramp up
our aggressive principal travel schedule to continue to
build a presence in the communities and states we need
to win on Election Day. On Labor Day alone, the Vice
President will travel to Detroit, Michigan and then join
President Biden in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, while
Governor Walz and First Lady Gwen Walz will spend their
Labor Day in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The Harris-Walz
campaign also plans to send key surrogates including
Governor JB Pritzker, Mitch Landrieu, and Tom Perez, and
others to top battlegrounds including North Carolina,
Nevada, and Georgia.
Key moments ahead, like the September 10 presidential debate and the start of Hispanic Heritage Month, will critical in activating supporters and surrogates to campaign in battleground states.
Labor Day also brings the start of voting season, with the first ballots of this election being mailed to voters later this week. As Americans begin to cast their votes, Team Harris-Walz and Democrats across the country are focused on making sure every eligible voter can cast a ballot and have that ballot counted.
With tools like IWillVote.com, Democrats are giving voters
all the resources they need to make their voices heard
in this election. Our campaign is also building
the largest voter protection program in American
presidential history. We have
more than 100 voter protection staff across a dozen
states, with thousands of volunteers nationally. We are
continuing to recruit poll and count observers as well
as volunteers for our hotline, which will bolster other
state and national hotlines. And as more Americans begin
early voting, we will work to make sure every single
eligible voter has a plan to make their voices heard.
Bottom line: Make no mistake: the next 65 days will be very hard. This race will remain incredibly close, and the voters who will decide this election will require an extraordinary amount of work to win over. But we have the candidate, message, and operation that brings Americans together to chart a new way forward, so we can once again defeat Donald Trump.