US vice president Kamala Harris will pledge to Americans that she will work to improve their lives while Republican Donald Trump is only in it for himself as she delivers her campaign’s closing argument on Tuesday from the same site where the former president fomented the Capitol insurrection in 2021.
One week out from election day, Ms Harris’ address from the grassy Ellipse near the White House is designed to encourage Americans to visualise their alternate futures if she or Mr Trump takes over the Oval Office in less than three months.
She hoped to sharpen that contrast by delivering her capstone speech from the place where Mr Trump on January 6th, 2021, spewed falsehoods about the 2020 presidential election that inspired a crowd to march to the Capitol and try unsuccessfully to halt the certification of Democrat Joe Biden’s victory and the sealing of his own defeat.
With time running out and the race razor-tight, Ms Harris and Mr Trump have both been looking for big moments to try to shift the momentum one way or the other.
But after her speech in the nation’s capital, Ms Harris will be back to furiously scouring for votes one rally and one event after another in the battleground states.
On Tuesday, aides said, Ms Harris aims to look beyond the startling imagery of her location on the Ellipse to make a broader case for voters to reject Mr Trump and consider what she offers.
“There’s a big difference between he and I,” Ms Harris told reporters on Monday in previewing her speech.
“If he were elected, on day one he’s going to sit in the Oval Office working on his enemies list.
“On day one, if I am elected, which I fully expect to be, I will be working on behalf of the American people on my to-do list.”
Campaign aides stressed that she will not be delivering a treatise on democracy – a staple of president Biden’s own attempts to draw a contrast with Mr Trump.
But her campaign is hoping the setting will help catch the attention of battleground state voters who remain on the fence about whom to vote for – or whether to vote at all.
Mr Trump was set to use planned remarks to reporters at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida on Tuesday morning to attempt to pre-emptively rebut Ms Harris’ speech, according to a person familiar with the matter.
