Former Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-Texas) was lavish with praise for Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D), suggesting the pair will restore “hope” to the November presidential election.
“Instead of hate there’s hope,” O’Rourke said of the Harris-Waltz campaign. Friday Interview MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace appears on “Deadline: White House.”
He added, “Instead of grievances, we have ambition. That’s really America at its best.”
Like Harris, O’Rourke ran unsuccessfully in the 2020 Democratic presidential primary against President Biden and worked alongside Walz during his six years in the House of Representatives.
“I’m incredibly proud of Vice President Harris and Governor Walz for finding this moment and overcoming what’s been engineered in the political labs and the corporate side of things,” the former Texas gubernatorial candidate continued, “and discovering the foundation of our democracy: people coming together, finding connection and joy in that.”
Harris’ rise to the top of the Democratic field after President Biden dropped his candidacy has energized and excited party members. She has secured huge funding and her campaign held massive rallies in key battleground states last week. The Harris campaign boasted that 14,000 people attended a rally in Philadelphia on Tuesday and 15,000 attended another event in Detroit on Wednesday night.
Harris is also neck and neck with Trump in the polls, with the former president’s approval rating at 47.4 percent and the vice president’s at 47.2 percent, in the Hill/Decision Desk average of national polls.
Asked at a news conference at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on Thursday whether he was afraid of the size of Harris’ audience, Trump sounded annoyed.
“Come on, come on,” Trump said. “Look, there were 107,000 in New Jersey and you didn’t report it. I’m so glad you asked. Were there 2,000 yesterday?”
