WASHINGTON: U

S vice-prez Kamala Harris has pretty much wrapped the Democratic nomination for the presidential election well before a formal process and the party convention on Aug 19, belying expectation in some quarters of internecine warfare. The party’s leadership, including Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer and House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries, lawmakers, donors, activists, backroom operatives, and most of all the nearly 4000 delegates who will formally vote for the nomination quickly lined up behind Harris after a day of tumult when Prez Biden bowed out of the race on Sunday.
An unofficial survey of delegates by the AP showed Harris with more than 2,500 delegates, well over the 1,976 needed to win a vote in the coming weeks.The nomination was bequeathed and blessed by the prez himself when Harris travelled to the Democratic campaign HQ in Wilmington, Delaware, Biden’s home state, on Monday to literally inherit the campaign.Secluded because of Covid at his home nearby, Biden phoned in to event to thank his staff and ask them to support Kamala with “every bit of your heart and soul.” “The name has changed at the top of the ticket, but the mission hasn’t changed at all.
We still need to save this democracy. Trump is… a danger to the nation,” Biden said, repeatedly asserting that he’s “not going anywhere” and he will be campaigning for Harris soon.
“I’m watching you kid, I love you,” he said, cutting in when Harris was recalling how she and husband Doug regarded the prez and his wife Jill as family. Asserting that “we made the right decisions… we have a great great candidate,” Biden urged his campaign staff to “embrace her…she’s the best”.
It has been a remarkable turnaround for the US vice-prez, who only a few months ago was under pressure for what many party activists saw as a lacklustre performance, with some even suggesting she should be jettisoned from the ticket and Biden should pick a new running mate. But within 48 hours of Biden’s exit from the race, the atmosphere has been transformed, with a palpable surge of energy and vitality — not to speak of money — flowing into the campaign. Since Sunday, Harris has raised $100 million, including $81 million in the first 24 hours since announcing prez bid, a record showing as donors and contributors re-opened the money spigot after what some operatives termed as a “Dembargo” to pressu re the prez into bowing out.
With Biden’s exit from the race, Trump now becomes oldest presidential candidate in US history. In her remarks, a firedup Harris (59) immediately drew a contrast with her 78-year-old opponent, accusing him of wanting to “take our country backwards to a time before many of our fellow Americans had full freedoms and rights”. “We believe in a brighter future that makes room for all Americans. Over the next 106 days, we are going to take our case to the American people, and we are going to win,” she said.
Referring to her career as a courtroom prosecutor and at torney general before she became a senator and vice-prez, Harris threw out a warning to Trump. “In those roles I took on perpetrators of all kinds… Predators who abused women, fraudsters who ripped off consumers, cheaters who broke the rules for their own gain. So, hear me when I say I know Donald Trump’s type,” she said.
The dramatic turnaround on the Democratic side has enraged Trump and his MAGA flock, who flooded the social media platform X, owned by Trump supporter Elon Musk, with posts about Biden’s purported death, Harris’ coup, and araft of ugly racist rants.