Vice President Kamala Harris is attempting a high-risk, high-reward strategy by bringing out heavy-hitter surrogates, from former President Barack Obama to Beyonce, in the closing days of her 2024 campaign.
Obama will appear with Harris on Thursday in Atlanta, their first rally together since he began campaigning on her behalf. Obama will continue his battleground state tour Monday in Philadelphia.
Beyonce will then reportedly speak and perform before Harris’s event Friday in the music icon’s hometown of Houston, Texas, a prospect that was teased this summer during the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
The rallies are Harris’s latest and possibly last attempt to increase voter enthusiasm as momentum in the race moves somewhat in former President Donald Trump’s direction. In the past, she has enlisted the help of celebrities, from Oprah Winfrey to Bruce Springsteen.
However, the guest appearances also pose a political liability to her campaign. Harris, already competing for the spotlight with Trump, could get overshadowed when handing it to her special guests, or they could create a distraction.
There are not many politicians who can demonstrate the same showmanship as Trump, who dominated headlines this week for working a fryer at a McDonald’s in Pennsylvania. On Sunday, he will stage a splashy rally at New York City‘s Madison Square Garden.
Harris has found her own ways to make her mark on what continues to be a toss-up contest. She will deliver her “closing argument” in remarks one week before Election Day from the Ellipse, the same place Trump addressed a crowd before the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.
However, Harris now finds herself in the headlines with Obama, but not all of them are positive.
Obama was praised for a rally Tuesday in Detroit, where he rapped “Lose Yourself” after Eminem introduced him onstage. Earlier this month, Obama stirred controversy by suggesting that sexism is the reason for the perceived reluctance of black men to support Harris.
Democratic strategist Stefan Hankin conceded “the two-sentence clip” of Obama telling at a Pittsburgh party campaign field office that black men seem not to be “feeling the idea of having a woman as president” sounded “weird” without “the context.”
“There’s always gonna be people out there to take the, slice down whatever speech you give or whatever comment you give and put it in the worst light humanly possible,” Hankin told the Washington Examiner.
The Harris campaign has carefully managed her previous engagements with Obama, with the vice president and Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN) holding their own rally in Milwaukee when Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama spoke at the Democratic convention in their hometown. The Obamas were also not included in-person on camera in their endorsement video for Harris, with only their voices heard.
Democrats have dismissed speculation the Harris campaign is concerned that Barack Obama could overshadow the vice president, unlike their concerns about his dynamic with President Joe Biden.
“She is not concerned about being overshadowed by Obama,” Aggressive Progressive podcast host Christopher Hahn told the Washington Examiner.
Meanwhile, the Trump campaign has embraced the former president’s newfound momentum, contending his “celebrity alone is enough to fill stadiums.”
Trump’s crowd sizes have become a personal sensitivity and political vulnerability for the former president, one that Harris took advantage of during their one and only debate last month in Philadelphia.
Regardless, the Trump campaign argued the former president has regained his position in the polls after Harris’s summer surge because “everyday families know that only he can lower costs, secure the border, and ‘Make America Great Again‘ after Kamala’s four years of failure.”
“Kamala wants to be overshadowed because she loses votes every time she opens her mouth, but President Trump will continue to share his winning message to Americans far and wide,” Republican National Committee spokeswoman Anna Kelly told the Washington Examiner.
Springsteen’s performance at the Harris and Barack Obama rally will launch what the vice president’s campaign is calling its “When We Vote We Win” concert series, which will include all seven battleground states.
The Harris campaign told the Washington Examiner the concert series is an opportunity to turn voter enthusiasm into actual votes and supporters into volunteers, even if that is relational organizing or convincing their family and friends to cast their ballots for the vice president.
“Celebrities play a critical role in driving energy and excitement at such an important part of the campaign,” Michael Hardaway, a former aide to House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), Barack Obama, and Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL), told the Washington Examiner. “It’s especially helpful when those celebrities are willing to join a candidate when they visit their hometown.”
“It’s also great because their participation encourages their peers to dip their toe in the water and join them in supporting a candidate,” Hardaway said. “Usher, Eminem, Willie Nelson, and Beyonce are obviously four of the biggest stars in the history of music, so this is a huge get for Kamala at this point.”
Harris’s star power has attracted criticism from Trump, who complained about the vice president’s rally-turned-concert this summer, featuring Megan Thee Stallion and Quavo, in Atlanta.
“Crazy Kamala Harris, voted the WORST Vice President in American history, needed a concert to bring people into the Atlanta arena, and they started leaving 5 minutes into her speech,” Trump wrote on social media at the time. “I don’t need concerts or entertainers, I just have to MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!!!”
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Middlebury College political science professor Bert Johnson advised the Harris campaign not to compare its events with those of Trump “or to try to duplicate the spectacle.”
“As with more standard joint appearances and endorsements, Harris’s team is likely betting on garnering relatively friendly local and social media coverage,” Johnson told the Washington Examiner.
Marisa Schultz contributed to this report.