Kamala Harris was back in Pa. for the 12th time, stopping in Johnstown before a rally in Wilkes-Barre
Harris spent most of the week in Pennsylvania, highlighted by the only debate so far between her and Republican nominee former President Donald Trump, held Tuesday in Philadelphia.
Vice President Kamala Harris made her way to Pennsylvania Friday for the 12th time this year, this time to galvanize support in counties that went for former President Donald Trump in the 2020 election.
During her second stop, in Wilkes-Barre in Luzerne County, Harris announced for the first time a pledge to lower barriers to entry for federal government jobs.
Earlier Harris landed at John Murtha Johnstown-Cambria Airport on Air Force Two just before 1:50 p.m. She was greeted by Sen. John Fetterman (D., Pa.), his wife, Gisele, and Johnstown Mayor Frank Janakovic, who were joined by more than 400 invited onlookers, some of whom had been there for several hours.
The small city is a purple region within red Cambria County.
Friday evening, across the state in Wilkes-Barre, Harris sought to further define herself to voters who may not know enough about who she is, and to contrast her candidacy with Trump’s.
Both Harris and Trump have zeroed in on Pennsylvania, the “swingiest” swing state in a crucial presidential election as must-win for their campaigns. Between the two of them, they’ve visited the commonwealth two dozen times, and that doesn’t include the stand-alone visits from Harris’ VP running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, or Trump’s running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance.
Harris and Trump are locked in a dead heat among Pennsylvania voters, according to an August Emerson College/the Hill poll.
Here are takeaways from her Pennsylvania visit Friday.
Harris is going after white, working-class voters in the Rust Belt
Speaking at the Wilkes-Barre event, Harris outlined, for the first time, plans to roll back degree requirements for federal government jobs.
“As president, I will get rid of the unnecessary degree requirements for federal jobs and increase jobs for folks without a four-year degree, understanding that requiring a certain degree does not necessarily talk about one’s skills.”
She emphasized creating good-paying jobs that don’t require college degrees.
“For way too long,” Harris said, “our nation has encouraged only one path to success, a four-year degree.” She called for more alternative paths, including apprenticeships and vocational schools, ideas met with roars from the Wilkes-Barre crowd.
Harris also outlined her proposed expanded child tax credit, up to $6,000 for families with new babies, as an opportunity to buy basics like a stroller, crib, and baby clothes.
In Johnstown, Harris visited Classic Elements, a woman-owned local small business in a heavily Republican area where the VP was greeted by some Trump supporters alongside her own. She called the shop owners “civic leaders.”
“I am feeling very good about Pennsylvania,” Harris said during a brief stop at the business in downtown Johnstown, “because there are a lot of people in Pennsylvania who deserve to be seen and heard.”
She added: “We’re going to be spending a lot more time in Pennsylvania.”
The Johnstown small business visit comes after Harris touted her commitment to provide $50,000 in tax credits for small businesses if elected during Tuesday’s presidential debate, part of her “opportunity economy” pitch to the former steel town, which Trump narrowly won in 2016. During Trump’s 2020 visit to the town, he declared he’d “brought back steel.”
In reality, steel production didn’t return to the area under Trump or President Joe Biden.
The Trump campaign issued a statement on Harris’ Pennsylvania visit, saying “Pennsylvanians are fed up with the rising costs of groceries, gas and utilities,” and blaming the Biden-Harris administration for those rising costs. Economists have noted the height of now-falling inflation was neither Biden nor Trump’s fault.
Both candidates are trying to appeal to working-class voters in the region and have expressed opposition to a proposed sale of U.S. Steel to Japanese company Nippon Steel.
The United Steelworkers union has endorsed Harris.
Trump gave Harris a lot of talking points after Tuesday’s debate
“Concepts of a plan,” is one of them. It was part of Trump’s response when moderators at the presidential debate held in Philadelphia asked the candidate about his health-care plan.
Mere mention of the debate sent the Wilkes-Barre crowd roaring. And it seems the former president’s debate performance gave Harris more material to use in her ongoing quest to draw a sharp distinction between herself and Trump, and to paint him as extreme.
“Stop with all the trying to divide us,” Harris said of Trump. “People are exhausted with that stuff.”
She also called on rally attendees to remember what she outlined as Trump’s strategic plan to overturn abortion rights by appointing three conservative U.S. Supreme Court justices.
“We are ready for a new generation of leadership who is optimistic about what we can do together,” Harris said.
Harris is still introducing herself, and her accomplishments, to voters
A September New York Times/Siena poll found nearly one-third of voters felt they didn’t know enough about Harris. Speaking Friday evening, she highlighted the earlier parts of her resume.
Harris recounted her career as a young prosecutor in San Francisco, and California’s attorney general, where her accomplishments included scoring a $25 billion foreclosure settlement for families against predatory mortgage lenders and prosecuting what she’s repeatedly referred to as “transnational” cartels.
“I know these cartels firsthand, and as president, I will make sure we prosecute them to the full extent of the law for pushing poison like fentanyl on our children,” Harris said.
The comments are in line with her apparent attempts to distance herself from the Trump campaign’s assertions that she’s too liberal, and even a Marxist.
During Tuesday’s debate at the National Constitution Center, for example, Harris responded to a question about gun violence and gun control by revealing that she carries a gun.
Harris has spent most of the last week in the state, debating Trump in Philadelphia on Tuesday after spending last weekend in Pittsburgh. She visited Shanksville on Wednesday with Biden to commemorate the Sept. 11 anniversary.