Harris, Walz be part of marketing campaign finance calls, declare the ‘combat’s not over’

Vice President Kamala Harris on Tuesday thanked supporters throughout a digital name and vowed that the “combat’s not over” in her first remarks since conceding defeat to President-elect Donald Trump three weeks in the past.

“The combat that fueled our marketing campaign, a combat for freedom and alternative, that didn’t finish on Nov. 5. A combat for the dignity of all folks? That didn’t finish on Nov. 5,” Harris stated. “A combat for the long run, a future through which all folks obtain the promise of America? No. A combat that’s a few combat for the beliefs of our nation, the beliefs that replicate the promise of America? That combat’s not over.”

“That combat’s nonetheless in us, and it burns robust,” Harris later added. “And I do know that is an unsure time. I am clear-eyed about that. I do know you are clear-eyed about it, and it feels heavy. And I simply should remind you: Do not you ever let anyone take your energy from you. You have got the identical energy that you just did earlier than Nov. 5 and you’ve got the identical objective that you just did and you’ve got the identical skill to interact and encourage. So do not ever let anyone or any circumstance take your energy from you.”

The grassroots name got here instantly after Harris held a name along with her marketing campaign’s finance committee. The finance name was attended by greater than 400 donors, in keeping with a supply acquainted.

On the grassroots name, Harris additionally briefly mentioned the historic sum of cash that ran her marketing campaign, although she didn’t handle what went flawed as she and her marketing campaign face intense scrutiny over how they may elevate that cash and lose to Trump so resolutely.

​​“The result of this election, clearly, just isn’t what we needed. It isn’t what we work so laborious for,” Harris stated. “However I’m happy with the race we ran. And your position on this was crucial. What we did in 107 days was unprecedented.”

Harris stated that over the course of these 100-plus days, her marketing campaign raised $1.4 billion, a lot of which was from grassroot donors: “Almost 8 million donors contributed a median donation of about $56.”

“You gave all that you would to help our marketing campaign. Due to your efforts — get this — we raised an historic $1.4 billion, virtually $1.5 billion from grassroots supporters alone, essentially the most in presidential marketing campaign historical past,” she stated.

“Being concerned could make a distinction, and that is still true. And that is one of many items that I simply need us to please take away — that our combat for freedom and for alternative and for the promise of America, it included, for instance, almost virtually 4 million first-time contributors to our marketing campaign due to the work you probably did, of serving to folks know that they are often engaged and that they don’t seem to be exterior, that they are inside, that we’re all on this collectively,” she added.

Harris was joined by her former operating mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, on each calls — a uncommon look from the 2, although Harris joined the decision from San Francisco and Walz from Minnesota.

Walz on the grassroot donor name additionally spoke to supporters’ feeling of loss following the election and repeated Harris’ claims that she just isn’t completed with preventing.

“I believe all of us noticed the likelihood, and I do know there is a little bit of a sense of loss as a result of we noticed what an actual chief seems to be like,” Walz stated.

“She did ship one of the best of our higher angels,” he added. “She delivered a imaginative and prescient the place all of us mattered. She did it with grace and dignity and continues to do this each single day. She remains to be on this combat. She is doing it each single day. She just isn’t completed along with her present job. She’s not completed being a part of it with all of you.”

Harris’ and Walz’s remarks comply with some postelection evaluation from Harris marketing campaign senior officers throughout an episode of “Pod Save America” that aired on Tuesday, together with some response to funds.

Harris marketing campaign Chairwoman Jennifer O’Malley Dillon stated that through the cycle, the majority of the marketing campaign’s spending was used to achieve out to “very-hard-to-find voters,” together with low-propensity and younger voters, whereas investing throughout all swing states as a result of polling mirrored that every was in play.

“We have been making an attempt to, sure, spend extra assets on digital … as a result of we’re looking for younger folks, we’re looking for these lower-propensity voters that have been tuned out to politics,” O’Malley Dillon stated.

“We had some distinctive issues that we needed to do on this race that I believe have been actually crucial to do early and spent lots of assets at an earlier stage than we must,” she added, noting these assets have been spent on each promoting and area programming. “We noticed, up till the very finish, that … each single state was in such a margin of error. There was nothing that instructed us we could not play in one in all these states.”

Throughout the podcast, O’Malley Dillon and senior marketing campaign adviser David Plouffe accused the Trump marketing campaign of coordinating with its tremendous PACs, a follow that isn’t authorized, however famous the Democrats must take observe and do the identical.

“We now have to cease enjoying a special recreation because it pertains to tremendous PACs and the Republicans. Love our Democratic attorneys. I am bored with it, OK? They coordinate greater than we do. I believe amongst themselves, I believe with the presidential marketing campaign, like I am simply sick and drained, OK? So, we can’t be at an obstacle,” Plouffe stated.

“I believe our facet was fully mismatched when it got here to the ecosystem of Trump and his tremendous PACs and ours,” O’Malley Dillon stated.

“We had a brilliant PAC that was useful, essential and needed for the work that they did as a result of they have been the type of central recipients of lots of the funding on our facet they usually staked a method and a plan, and we clearly may see it, and we knew what it was [going] to spend, however we didn’t have the power to have folks are available in with us early. And so each ounce of promoting, each ounce of carrying these strategic imperatives, of defining the vice chairman and making an attempt to convey down Trump’s numbers, all sat with us as a marketing campaign,” O’Malley Dillon added.

Harris has hardly ever been seen since she delivered her concession speech at Howard College the day after the election. She attended the Veterans Day ceremony at Arlington Nationwide Cemetery per week later and was seen making her first return to the White Home a day after that. The vice chairman additionally spent the final week on trip in Hawaii.

Walz, within the month because the election, has remained virtually completely out of the nationwide highlight, resuming his duties because the governor of Minnesota.

He delivered his last speech of the 2024 marketing campaign cycle on Nov. 8 from suburban Minneapolis, becoming a member of a refrain of fellow Democratic governors who stated they’d shield their states from threats to reproductive freedoms, citizenship and different issues beneath the Trump administration. The previous vice presidential nominee additionally stated he’d work to seek out frequent floor with swaths of people that voted “for the opposite facet” on Nov. 5.

Harris and Walz remained principally separate on the marketing campaign path within the roughly 15 weeks she had him as her operating mate. The governor was current at Harris’ concession speech at Howard College the night time after the election however didn’t communicate or publicly work together along with her. Earlier than that, the 2 held a joint rally on Oct. 28 in Ann Arbor, Michigan, their first occasion collectively since late August, after they have been seen collectively in Savannah, Georgia, on a bus tour.

Previous to that, their final time at a rally collectively was in Milwaukee for programming linked to the Democratic Nationwide Conference in August.