Bill Clinton Hasn’t Lost His Zeal for Boosting Democrats on the Trail

Happy Friday! Election Day is 18 days away. Have you ever felt like someone is raising expectations too high for you? We bet you didn’t have it like then-Sen. Barack Obama, whose comedy routine at the 2008 Al Smith Dinner was hyped up by his opponent, the late Sen. John McCain.

Up to Speed

• Former President Donald Trump on Thursday delivered a keynote address at the Al Smith Dinner, an event hosted by the Catholic Archdiocese of New York that traditionally features the Democratic and Republican nominees delivering comedic remarks. But this year’s dinner was somewhat different. Vice President Kamala Harris declined an invitation to address the dinner in person, instead appearing via a short, pre-recorded video in which she took a couple of subtle shots at Trump. In the bit, Harris is talking with actress Molly Shannon, who is playing the character of a Catholic school student she made popular on NBC’s Saturday Night Live. Shannon’s character is advising the vice president on what to say, and not say, in the video. Among her recommendations: “Don’t bear false witness to thy neighbor,” to which Harris responds: “Especially thy neighbor’s election results.” Trump also took a shot at Harris, saying early in his remarks: “My opponent feels like she does not have to be here, which is deeply disrespectful to the event, in particular, and to our great Catholic community. Very disrespectful.”
• In an interview at the dinner with Raymond Arroyo of EWTN, a Catholic television network, Trump expressed some openness to religious exemptions from his proposed mandate for insurance coverage of in vitro fertilization. “I haven’t been asked that, but it sounds to me like a pretty good idea,” he said of exemptions, adding: “Certainly, if there’s a religious problem, I think people should go with that. I really think they should be able to do that, but we’ll look at that.” Additionally, he did not commit to reinstating the Mexico City Policy, which President Joe Biden rescinded after Trump revived and expanded it during his presidential term. The policy prohibited nongovernmental organizations receiving federal funds from promoting or performing abortions in other countries. “We’re going to be giving that a very good, serious look—in other words, how that compares and competes with the states—but we’ll be giving that a very serious look,” he said. Ronald Reagan originated the policy in 1984, and it has been rescinded and revived along party lines ever since.
• Nebraska Sen. Deb Fischer led independent challenger Dan Osborn 49 percent to 43 percent in an internal poll conducted for the incumbent Republican’s campaign, The Hill’s Al Weaver reports. Nebraska is ruby-red territory in statewide elections, and Fischer’s reelection was considered a foregone conclusion. But Osborn, a center-left populist vowing he would not align with the Democratic caucus or the Republican conference if he wins in November, has made the contest competitive. Reliable public polling for this contest is thin. However, Republicans are at least somewhat concerned. The national GOP has dumped resources into Nebraska on Fischer’s behalf and Trump recently cut a direct-to-camera television ad urging Nebraskans to vote for her.  
• Polling trends this election cycle suggest Trump is poised to overperform with black voters compared to 2020 and 2016. But a survey of black voters in battleground states commissioned for Howard University may dampen expectations. In the poll from Howard Initiative for Public Opinion, Harris led Trump 84 percent to 8 percent, with 8 percent undecided, NBC News reports. The survey, conducted earlier this month but released just this week, had an error margin of plus-or-minus 3.2 percentage points. Howard University is a historically black college in Washington, D.C. The vice president is among its alumni.
• Harris’ Wednesday interview with Fox News anchor Bret Baier attracted 7.8 million total viewers, among them more than 1.1 million viewers in the 25-54 age demographic sought after by advertisers, AdWeek reports, citing Nielsen Media Research data. The sit-down, lasting roughly a half hour, was taped in the afternoon and aired just after 6 p.m. Eastern Time on Special Report w/ Bret Baier, the cable news network’s national news program that broadcasts live Monday through Friday. Baier’s interview with Harris was the vice president’s first on Fox News, at least since becoming the Democratic nominee, if not ever. When Special Report reaired at midnight ET, the program, and presumably the interview, “was seen by an additional 1.3 million total viewers and 273,000 demo viewers,” according to AdWeek.  

In North Carolina, Bill Clinton Relishes Being Back on the Trail 

DURHAM, North Carolina—The former president sat up in his chair onstage, appearing to listen attentively as Gov. Tim Walz, the current Democratic nominee for vice president, ticked through the lines of his stump speech. This is Bill Clinton’s ninth presidential election since and including his first White House campaign in 1992. He’s heard it all—every talking point, every manufactured quip, every soaring bit of rhetoric guaranteed to make an audience break out in applause. Whenever Walz deployed a laugh line, Clinton’s slack jaw would tighten, his head would turn to look at someone in the audience, and he would grin. 

“I’m a little bit giddy here, I’m standing on a stage with the 42nd president of the United States,” said Walz as the crowd of several hundred, standing in the basketball gym in a recreation center in Durham’s Lyon Park neighborhood Thursday afternoon, erupted into cheers. “This is the Comeback Kid.”

And Clinton keeps coming back, election after election, to campaign for Democrats. He has a busy schedule this weekend in North Carolina, hitting multiple stops throughout the majority-black rural areas in the eastern part of the state. He’ll even attend a service at a black church on Sunday morning. It’s part of the all-hands-on-deck approach to boosting Harris in the final weeks of the race that also has Barack Obama making campaign appearances on the vice president’s behalf.

But it’s clear the 78-year-old Clinton in particular relishes being on the trail. Ever the “explainer-in-chief,” he spent nearly 40 minutes in Durham walking the audience methodically through the case for Harris, never seeming to grow tired as he made long discursions about consolidation in the grocery retail industry or mused about where he would prefer to be imprisoned in a second Trump administration. (Guantanamo Bay, Clinton reasoned, because “when you’re 78, you’re a lot more worried about being too cold than being too hot.”) After his speech, Clinton and Walz both stepped down from the stage to shake hands and take selfies. One woman excitedly placed her baby with her in the frame with Clinton as her husband snapped a photo on his phone. Clinton’s grin as he walked the rope line never slipped.  

That’s not to say that the Big Dog’s oratorical gifts haven’t begun to falter. His voice has become shaky and soft, so much so that once he took the microphone on Thursday, his first few words were so difficult to hear that people in the back of the room began to shout, “We can’t hear you!” Clinton leaned into the microphone, cleared his throat, and said forcefully, “Can you hear now?” 

The room applauded, but the truth was that much of the rest of his lengthy speech was not easy to pick up in the echoing gym. The audience was almost silent throughout, with people leaning in to hear what the legendary Democrat had to say. Clinton himself seemed to acknowledge that he had more presidential races behind him than in front of him.

“I don’t know how many more elections I’ll be involved with,” he said with more than a touch of melancholy, before making his winking turn. “Heck, I’m only two months younger than Donald Trump.”

While most of the crowd was old enough to have memories of Clinton’s presidency, a number of the young people in attendance—including students from nearby Duke University and the historically black North Carolina Central University—had not even been born by the time he left office in 2001.

Ashante Farrior, a recent graduate of North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University in Greensboro, is one of them. Asked by Dispatch Politics after the Durham rally if she had seen Clinton before, she responded in the negative. “I’m 22, so it’s like, I’d only heard about the guy,” she said. “It’s cool, though.”

The same goes for Gabryelle Lane, a high-school student from Holly Springs who attended the rally with her mother. “I’ve heard a lot about him, and I’m just really interested in what he has to say in his take of what’s going on now,” Lane told Dispatch Politics.

Her mother, Kenya Lane, said it was her first time seeing Clinton in person and seemed wide-eyed in amazement after the fact. “He’s gotten older, of course,” Kenya said. “But he’s still talking strong.”

Strong or not, Clinton seemed as reluctant as ever to give up the microphone in Durham, even 35 minutes in. “You seldom get a chance to get as much good for as many people with one decision. So go out there and win this, because—” Clinton said as the by-then impatient crowd burst out in applause for what sounded like a closing line. The former president coughed, cleared his throat again, and kept going. “Your families need you. Future generations need you.”

The tired-looking Teamsters sitting in the bleachers behind the stage began to stand up, waving their signs, trying to will an end to the rally. And for two more excruciating minutes, Clinton extolled the virtues of early voting, of talking to friends and loved ones about the election, and about fighting for the future for the children.

“You can do it, and I think you will,” he said, at long last, as the music on the PA system played him and Walz off the stage.

In Backing Harris, Women Point to Abortion Rights as Driving Factor

LA CROSSE, Wisconsin—At a Thursday afternoon rally, Vice President Kamala Harris did not mention abortion until she was more than halfway through her remarks here. When she did, it got some of the loudest applause of the day.

“It is my pledge to you that when Congress passes a bill to restore reproductive freedom nationwide, as president of the United States, I will proudly sign it into law,” she said as the crowd at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse recreation center roared.

Many of Harris’ most committed female voters in La Crosse say their primary motivation for backing her is her support for legal access to abortion. In conversations with half a dozen women who came to see the vice president here, nearly all of them mentioned abortion as a key reason for their support, with several listing it first among the issues they care most about.

“She supports a woman’s right to choose and, as a woman, I think that’s really, really important,” Charlotte Tompkins, an 18-year-old student, told Dispatch Politics.

If Harris wins the 2024 presidential election, it will be in part thanks to her strong numbers with women and the potency of the abortion issue. In a recent poll from the New York Times, women broke for Harris over Donald Trump 56 percent to 40 percent, while men sided with the former president 53 percent to 42 percent. An issue survey from the Kaiser Family Foundation released last week found abortion was the No. 3 issue—behind inflation and threats to democracy—for female voters generally and the top issue for women under 30. For months, Trump has attempted to shore up his support among female voters by insisting the regulation of abortion be left up to the states. That has not dissuaded Democrats from tying him to abortion bans at the state level. 

At her Thursday rally, Harris told the crowd, which appeared to be majority female, that a third of American women “live in a state with a Trump abortion ban,” accusing him of making his three Supreme Court appointments with the intention that they would overturn Roe v. Wade.

Among women at the rally, support for Harris’ position on abortion spanned age groups. Allison Hafner, 52, said she was “here for women’s rights.”

“I’m a big pro-choice person, and I don’t think anybody should tell us what we can and cannot do with our bodies,” she told Dispatch Politics.

Bonnie Roe, a 72-year-old retiree, echoed her comments. “I don’t think any man—or woman—should tell another woman what she should be doing with her own body. I think that’s just totally wrong,” she said.

While the women here were united in their backing of Harris’ abortion stance, their views varied on why men should support the vice president. The way Roe sees it, the potential for women they know to lose access to abortion should be reason enough for men to vote for her.

“Most of them have mothers, sisters, daughters, cousins, and any one of those women could be trapped in an unwanted pregnancy or dangerous pregnancy,” she said. “And that they would take the side of no abortion rights at all in this country and let their loved ones die because some politician says abortion should be outlawed is so wrong.”

A 36-year-old named Amber, who works in social services and declined to give her last name, meanwhile, said the insults Trump regularly directs at Harris and other women are detrimental.

“I’d say that if you have a daughter who wants to be in any position of leadership or any position that, like, has wielding throughout the world, you should encourage her and not demean her with nicknames and the things that Donald Trump perpetuates, such as insulting women’s intelligence,” she said.

A male attendee, 35-year-old Tim Schneider, who works as a public school teacher in St. Paul, Minnesota, and was in town visiting his mother, said he would pitch his fellow men on helping the women in their lives, arguing that a Harris presidency would be better for Americans in general.

“Think of your wives and think of your daughters. I don’t think it has to go a whole lot more further than that,” he said in reference to women losing abortion access. “But also, I mean, even if you look at the policies, Kamala’s policies are better for 95 percent of Americans across the board.”

Eyes on the Trail

• Vice President Kamala Harris campaigns today in Michigan, hosting rallies in Grand Rapids and suburban Detroit’s Oakland County, while also speaking at a third campaign event in Lansing, the state capital. On Saturday, Harris campaigns in Detroit before heading to Atlanta to host a rally focused on mobilizing the early vote, now underway in Georgia.
• Former President Donald Trump will be in suburban Detroit’s Oakland County this evening for a “roundtable” hosted by the group Building America’s Future. There, the Republican nominee will be joined by Michigan GOP Senate candidate Mike Rogers and Rep. Byron Donalds of Florida. Afterward, Trump will host a campaign rally in Detroit. On Saturday, Trump hosts an evening rally in Latrobe, Pennsylvania. On Sunday evening the former president hosts a rally in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
• On Saturday, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz will headline a Harris fundraiser in Chicago before traveling to Omaha, Nebraska. There, the Democratic vice presidential nominee will deliver remarks at a Harris fundraiser and, separately, host a campaign rally aimed at voters in the 2nd Congressional District, which under the Cornhusker State’s system of proportional allocation is worth one vote in the Electoral College. On Sunday, Walz attends a morning service at a black church in Saginaw, Michigan, before heading to Boston and Greenwich, Connecticut, to headline two Harris campaign fundraisers.
• Second gentleman Doug Emhoff stumps today for Harris in Reno, Nevada, before heading to Yuma, Arizona, where he will campaign for the vice president on Saturday. Both events are aimed at mobilizing the early vote. On Sunday, Emhoff will be in Michigan for events in Grand Rapids and Detroit. In Grand Rapids, the second gentleman will be joined by billionaire businessman Mark Cuban and focus on promoting Harris’ small-business agenda, while in Detroit Emhoff will headline a gathering geared toward mobilizing Jewish voters.
• The Trump campaign sends surrogates on road today in Red Springs, North Carolina, with Sen. Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma; former Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (a former Democrat); and Donald Trump Jr., the former president’s oldest son, delivering remarks at an evening event.
• The Trump campaign’s three-day North Carolina bus tour concludes today with stops in Jacksonville, Winterville, and Goldsboro. Headliners include Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith of Mississippi, Rep. Dan Bishop of North Carolina, former Trump administration officials Peter Navarro and Matt Whitaker, and others.
• The Trump campaign is hosting a “Believers for Trump” event this evening in Austell, Georgia, featuring Ben Carson, secretary of housing and urban development under the former president; veteran conservative activist Ralph Reed; and Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Whatley.
• The Trump campaign’s “Reclaim America” tour hits Omaha, Nebraska, on Saturday, with a discussion moderated by attorney Leo Terrell featuring Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and former Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, a former Democrat. Kennedy is a former Democrat who waged an independent presidential bid before dropping out and endorsing Trump.

Notable and Quotable

“I guess I just don’t see the point of taking shots at myself when other people have been shooting at me for a hell of a long time.”

—Former President Donald Trump at the Al Smith Dinner explaining why he did not want to make self-deprecating jokes, October 17, 2024