Vice President Kamala Harris delivers the keynote address at the American Federation of Teachers 88th National Convention in Houston on July 25, 2024.
Brendan Smirovsky | AFP | Getty Images
Vice President Kamala Harris blasted former President Donald Trump’s policy agenda as “chaos, fear and hate” in a fiery speech Thursday after telling members of the nation’s second-largest teachers union that she campaigned President was her first public school grade teacher and “a lot of people like you.”
“In this moment, we are fighting for our most basic freedoms,” Harris said in her keynote speech at the American Federation of Teachers convention in Houston.
“Come on!” said the de facto Democratic nominee, before her audience began chanting the words.
Harris contrasted her agenda on abortion and LGBTQ rights, gun control, support for organized labor and student loan debt relief with the policies of Republican candidate Trump and his allies on these issues.
Shortly after Harris finished her speech, the Trump campaign released a “Plan to Save American Education and Return Power to Parents,” which included a series of ideas that the Financial Times found anathema, including abolishing teacher tenure and adopting Performance pay.
Harris’ speech came four days after President Joe Biden said he would withdraw from the 2024 election and endorse her as the Democratic presidential candidate against Trump.
In an address to the nation from the Oval Office on Wednesday night, Biden said he would give up his “personal ambition” for a second term and aim to “save democracy” if Trump returns to the White House.
Before Harris took the stage Thursday, AFT President Randi Weingarten said she told Harris backstage that “her presence in the race has energized this race and energized this hall.” “
“Are you excited? Are you ready to elect the next president of the United States?” Weingarten asked the crowd, who responded enthusiastically.
Harris said at the start of her speech that Biden on Wednesday night “demonstrated once again what true leadership looks like.”
She thanked the AFT “for being the first union to support me this week.”
The vice president then laid the groundwork for the speech’s theme — America looks forward, not backward — by thanking her first-grade teacher, the late Frances Wilson, who she said “encouraged me, educated me, inspired me.” Got me.
“When I walked up to the podium to receive my law school diploma, Mrs. Frances Wilson was in the audience,” Harris said.
“It is because of Mrs. Frances Wilson and so many people like you that I stand before you as Vice President of the United States, and because I am running for President of the United States,” she said.
Harris said teachers like Wilson “are visionaries – you have a vision for the future…you see the potential in every child.”
“Today,” Harris said of Trump’s election, “we have a choice between two very different visions for the future.”
“One is focused on the future, and the other is focused on the past,” she said. “We are fighting for our future.”
“Ultimately, the question we face as a nation is, what kind of country do we want to live in? A country of freedom, compassion and the rule of law? Or a country of chaos and fear,” Harris said. And hatred? “
She tied Trump up 2025 plan — The Heritage Foundation’s 900-page vision for Trump’s second White House term — calling it “a plan to return America to its dark past.”
“Randy, can you believe they wrote this down?” Harris quipped to Weingarten.
“Donald Trump and his allies want to return America to failed trickle-down policies… union-busting, tax breaks for billionaires,” Harris said.
“You know, America has tried these failed economic policies before, but we’re not going back. We’re not going back,” Harris said to sustained applause.
“Donald Trump and his allies want to cut Medicare and Social Security… They even want to eliminate the Department of Education and end Head Start, which of course would deprive hundreds of thousands of our children of preschool.”
“He intends to end the Affordable Care Act,” she said. “Think about it: Let’s go back to a time when insurance companies had the power to deny coverage to people with pre-existing conditions.”
“We want to ban assault weapons and they want to ban books,” Harris said after an audience member yelled, “Tell them, President Harris!” “They passed so-called ‘don’t say gay’ laws,” Harris said.
“So today, I ask you, AFT, are you ready to have your voice heard?” Harris asked, before the audience yelled “Yeah!”
“Do we believe in freedom? Do we believe in opportunity? Do we believe in the promise of America? Are we ready to fight for it? When we fight, we win?” Harris asked, and the audience responded yes every time Answer.
The Trump campaign contrasted sharply with Harris’ remarks in an education plan released after her speech.
The plan would cut “federal funding to any school or program that promotes critical race theory, gender ideology, or other inappropriate racial, sexual, or political content on our children,” and “find and remove radicalized individuals who have infiltrated the federal Department of Education.” Molecule, “establish a new qualification certification body to certify teachers with patriotic values” and “implement direct parent election of principals. “
Trump said in a statement, “Our public schools have been taken over by radical leftist lunatics. This is my plan to save American education and restore power to American parents.
“As the saying goes, people are policy, and at the end of the day, if we let pink-haired communists teach our children, we’re going to have a big problem,” Trump said.
“When I am president, we will put parents back in control and give them the final say. We will get back to teaching reading, writing, and math (called arithmetic), and we will provide our children with a high-quality, pro-American education. Deserve an education.
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