DNC Could Be In Trouble
CNN panelists on “The Chris Wallace Show” predicted Saturday that anti-Israel protests at the Democratic National Convention (DNC) could potentially “damage” Vice President Kamala Harris’s reintroduction to voters.
Host Chris Wallace began the discussion by recalling how anti-Vietnam War protests during the 1968 DNC in Chicago “hurt” Democrats and then asked panelists whether pro-Palestine demonstrations might undermine Harris’s “coming out party” at the 2024 DNC.
Kristen Soltis Anderson, a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times, expressed concerns that protests against the war in Gaza could disrupt Harris’s debut at the DNC. She suggested that Harris’s presidential campaign might face challenges if it seems like Democrats are unable to manage their own convention.
We can’t help but notice that Milwaukee didn’t have to mobilize an entire battalion of police officers when we had our convention.
You can just feel the joy in the air in Chicago.
pic.twitter.com/Dc9AmdlIMT— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) August 19, 2024
“I expect that they likely will. They have certainly expressed interest in doing so, and I think that would be really, really big problem for Harris because she is using this convention week to introduce herself to voters who actually don’t know that much about what she has done as vice president over the last four years,” Anderson said. “In some ways, that blank canvas that you were talking about — the time when she was vice president — it’s sort of seen like a bad thing, right? That the administration — do they not trust her? Why are they not putting her out there? What has she actually done for the last four years? But that is now, weirdly enough, allowing her to have this break, to be this person who is her own person on issues like the economy, where voters were trusting Donald Trump over Joe Biden by huge margins. Now, she’s running much closer to Donald Trump. So, by having this opportunity at the convention to introduce herself, it’s a big important moment, and if it is overshadowed by chaos that makes voters think, ‘Oh look, Democrats can’t even control their own convention,’ how are they supposed to bring about law, order, safety, security, peace in this country? And that would be a bad message for them.”
Democrats want to defund the police…
Unless the police are surrounding the DNC to protect them. pic.twitter.com/Y3bybq0KxW
— Tim Young (@TimRunsHisMouth) August 18, 2024
According to WGN9, at least a dozen local businesses in Chicago have boarded up their windows and doors with plywood in preparation for potentially destructive protests outside the DNC.
CNN panelist Lulu Garcia-Navarro commented that the “images of chaos” resulting from unruly protests would be damaging to the Democratic Party.
Democrats want to defund the police…
Unless the police are surrounding the DNC to protect them. pic.twitter.com/Y3bybq0KxW
— Tim Young (@TimRunsHisMouth) August 18, 2024
“I think it’s potentially damaging,” Garcia-Navarro said. “I mean, that’s the objective of protests, right? They want attention, they want there to be accountability. There is a huge portion of the younger part of the Democratic Party that is very upset by what’s happening. And that’s why I think you’re seeing the clock ticking right now in terms of what’s happening in Israel and the ceasefire.”
After announcing his decision to forgo a reelection bid on July 21, Biden quickly endorsed Harris as his successor. Although she became the presumptive Democratic nominee in July, the vice president has yet to formally address the media through a sit-down interview or a news conference.
