Harris Campaign Recruits Obama to Drum Up Support Among Men

There’s still time to grab tickets to the biggest Dispatch event yet—our Dispatch Summit takes place on November 12 at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. Your favorite Dispatchers will unpack the 2024 presidential election live and talk with some of the best and brightest minds in policy, government, and law—including Vice President Mike Pence and Speaker of the House Paul Ryan.

You can grab your tickets here while they last. We can’t wait to see you in November. 

Happy Wednesday! Election Day is 13 days away. We can say confidently that we did not get hit by metal fragments while reporting on a Missouri Democrat’s Senate campaign.

Up to Speed

• Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign is concerned about cracks in the three “blue wall” states of Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania, NBC News reported Tuesday. Though the campaign publicly disputes it, officials told the outlet anonymously that Wisconsin and Michigan could go to former President Donald Trump. Should that happen, it would throw a wrench into Harris’ path to victory, as the three states are crucial to her quest for 270 Electoral College votes.
• Microsoft CEO Bill Gates and J.P. Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon both privately support Harris, though they have not said so in public, the New York Times reported in separate stories Tuesday. Gates has told friends and others that, although he does not typically make political donations, he gave $50 million to Future Forward, the chief outside group supporting the vice president, which does not disclose its donors. Meanwhile, Dimon has said privately that he supports Harris and would consider a position in her cabinet, such as Treasury secretary, though he has not made his backing public due to fear of retribution if Trump wins.
• In the aftermath of the January 6, 2021, riot, current Trump campaign manager Chris LaCivita liked and retweeted multiple posts on X, then Twitter, condemning those who stormed the Capitol and attributing the incident to Trump’s unfounded claims of a stolen election, CNN reported Wednesday. One such post was written by The Dispatch’s own John McCormack, who shared a text from a GOP Senate aide that called the day’s events “a disgusting tragedy” and said “someone literally lost their life because of a lie that Trump told.” LaCivita told CNN that his sharing the posts, some of which have been deleted from his profile, does not indicate support for what’s written in them. “Retweets and likes are not endorsements. I’m focused on winning the election two weeks from now, and not distractions from CNN,” he told the outlet.
• Republican Senate hopeful Kari Lake spoke at a rally in Peoria, Arizona, on Tuesday ahead of remarks from vice-presidential nominee J.D. Vance. Lake, a consistent defender of Donald Trump’s stolen election claims who is struggling in her race against Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego, took the stage soon after most of the audience had arrived. She ran through her stump speech in about five minutes and, after wrapping up and shaking a few hands, Dispatch Politics spotted her and her entourage speeding past the media riser and straight out the door—all about an hour before Vance actually took the stage. 
• Washington, D.C., officials are installing extra security measures on Capitol Hill to ensure safety around the certification of the 2024 election and inauguration of the 47th president. One such installment will be fencing around the Capitol from January 5 to January 21 next year. 

Obama Aims His Harris Pitch at Men

DETROIT—Barack Obama headlined a get-out-the-vote rally for Vice President Kamala Harris on Tuesday, making an impassioned case for the Democratic nominee and against cynicism and complacency. An enthusiastic crowd of roughly 12,000 people had packed the convention hall hours early to see the former president.

“Whether this election is making you feel excited or scared or hopeful or frustrated or anything in between, do not sit back and hope for the best,” Obama said, capping off 45 minutes of evening remarks inside the Huntington Place convention center on downtown Detroit’s waterfront. “I know I’m the ‘hope’ guy. But don’t just hope, get off your couch and vote.” 

With early in-person and mail-in voting now underway, the Harris campaign scheduled this rally to maximize pre-Election Day voting in the battleground state generally, and to juice support for the vice president in Metro Detroit particularly. Harris will outpace Republican nominee Donald Trump significantly in the Motor City, but the difference between a good showing and a really good showing could be the difference between victory and defeat on November 5. 

And so like Obama, who paired his promotion of Harris with a lengthy indictment of former President Donald Trump’s record and character, every warmup act who preceded the 44th president on stage encouraged the audience to vote early and get friends, neighbors, coworkers, and even strangers to do the same. That included the final warmup act, musical artist Marshall Mathers, a.k.a. Eminem, who introduced Obama.

“As most of you know, the city of Detroit and the whole state of Michigan mean a lot to me,” Mathers said. “Going into this election, the spotlight is on us more than ever. I think it’s important to use your voice so I’m encouraging everybody to get out and vote, please.”

This racially and demographically diverse group of Michiganders didn’t necessarily need encouragement. Most were clad in Harris gear; they cheered for the vice president; they booed Trump (“Don’t boo; vote,” Obama responded repeatedly.) This crowd is going to vote for Harris. 

But back in their communities, among acquaintances and at the doors they’ll knock on over the next two weeks—those people might not. Black men in particular appear poised to support Trump in higher numbers than in the past, a possibility Harris is working to countermand. 

That was the subtext of Obama’s comments directed to men who might be leaning toward Trump. A couple of weeks ago amid a swing through Pittsburgh, the former president aimed his remarks specifically at black men, generating quite a bit of news coverage—and some blowback. Here’s how Obama framed this message Tuesday evening:

“A while back I said this and some folks were asking me questions about it. When I said: ‘Look, especially some men seem to think Donald Trump’s behavior is somehow a sign of strength.’ I want to be clear, I want everybody to actually look at the record, I want them to educate themselves on the issues. I have friends who have voted Republican in the past. I do not think one party has the monopoly on all wisdom. But when I hear folks saying: ‘Yeah, I’m thinking about voting for him just because.’ And I say: ‘What?’ And they say: ‘Well I don’t know; he seems strong, he seems tough, I saw him at the UFC fight.’ I am here to tell you that is not what real strength is, it never has been … Real strength is taking responsibility for your actions and upholding your duty. Real strength is about telling the truth, even when it’s inconvenient.”

Obama likely wouldn’t address this potential vulnerability if the Harris campaign thought it nonexistent. What do black supporters of the vice president think? Dispatch Politics asked a few who showed up to see the former president. Count Florida Golden skeptical. 

“I don’t know where the media [is] getting their information from. But from my circle and the people I talk with, it’s not happening,” the 68-year-old retired union worker said, referring to support for Trump. As for Obama’s approach to urging black men to back the vice president, Golden approved. “Being a black man, sometimes we have to get direct hits to understand because we sometimes kind of shrug things off.”

Thea Simmons, a 70-year-old psychologist, also believes Harris is shoring up support with black men. “I think that’s being addressed really well,” Simmons said, referring to the attention the vice president and top surrogates like Obama have been paying to this cohort. But she conceded the problem does exist. “We all know that’s true,” Simmons said, attributing it to “internalized racism and internalized sexism.” 

Shannan Middleton, 19, a freelance graphic designer voting in his first election, said he is witnessing a Harris-Trump divide among young men like himself. 

“It’s split; it’s highly split. There are some of us that are going to vote Kamala. But there’s a lot of us that have looked at Trump and they’re going to vote Trump,” Middleton said. “Most of my friends that are voting for Trump, they’re mainly from a caucasian, Christian demographic … While many of the people that I see voting for Kamala—my family group—most of us are people of color, we come from diverse backgrounds.” 

Eyes on the Trail

• Vice President Kamala Harris this afternoon travels to Chester Township, Pennsylvania, in suburban Philadelphia, to participate in a CNN town hall meeting, airing live at 9 p.m. ET.
• Former President Donald Trump headlines a “Believers and Ballots Faith” town hall this afternoon in Zebulon, Georgia, where he will be joined by Lt. Gov. Burt Jones.
• Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz this evening headlines a Harris campaign fundraiser in Louisville, Kentucky. The Democratic vice presidential nominee then heads to North Carolina, where he is scheduled to campaign on Thursday.
• Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio delivers remarks this morning in Las Vegas. In the afternoon, the Republican vice presidential nominee speaks in Reno, Nevada. 
• Second gentleman Doug Emhoff campaigns today for Harris in South Florida, with a stop to encourage early and mail-in voting in Broward County, and a second stop headlining a fundraiser for the vice president in Miami-Dade County.
• The Trump campaign’s three-day Pennsylvania bus tour wraps up today with stops in Punxsutawney, Erie, and New Castle. Headliners include Rep. Byron Donalds of Florida, former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, and former Pentagon official Kash Patel.
• Former President Bill Clinton stumps for Harris today in Phoenix, where he will headline a “Black Voters for Harris-Walz” event and encourage early voting at a second event.
• First lady Jill Biden stumps for Harris today in Las Vegas, where she will headline events focused on early voting and “reproductive freedom.”
• Rep. Maxwell Frost of Florida campaigns for Harris today in Pittsburgh, where he will headline an event focused on voter turnout.* 

Notable and Quotable

“We’ve got to lock him up … politically lock him up, lock him out. That’s what we have to do.”

—President Joe Biden, speaking of former President Donald Trump while campaigning for Vice President Kamala Harris in New Hampshire, October 22, 2024

Correction, October 23, 2024: The original newsletter misattributed Rep. Frost’s state.