NEWPORT NEWS, Va. (WAVY) — Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff stressed the pro-labor, pro-business and pro-growth bonafides of Democratic presidential candidate and current Vice President Kamala Harris as he addressed a partisan crowd of about 1,100 people at Rep. Bobby Scott’s annual Labor Day cookout Monday.
He told the partisan audience how his wife, Harris, will ensure the progress that has been made under President Joe Biden will continue, and most importantly, he said, when she is in the breach, she will respond with drive, determination and doesn’t back down from a fight.
“It is because of Kamala Harris [that] we have united our party,” Emhoff said to cheers as he spoke for more than 15 minutes at the 47th annual event. “She’s united our country. She loves our country just like we love our country. We are patriots, and that is why you are hearing those chants there. And, by the way, this is not a honeymoon. This is not just a good start. This is a movement. This is a movement. But as she said during her amazing speech, … this is not only the election of our lifetimes, this is the election of our nation’s lifetime.”
He called on people not to be distracted by personal attacks, because they would not distract Harris.
Sen. Tim Kaine and other elected leaders also spoke at the event. Kaine, in an interview with 10 On Your Side’s Andy Fox, reiterated Emhoff’s point about not getting distracted by any attacks.
“It is important,” Kaine said. “There’s going to be a lot in the last 60 days of just junk and name-calling, and politics has gotten that way, but Kamala is very disciplined. And I saw this working with her on maternal mortality issues in the Senate when I was on the Health Committee. She challenged us, assembled a coalition — Democrats and Republicans — to get some good things done to deal with those significant problems that she cared about, and I did too. I saw that drive and determination, and I saw the focus that she’s not going to get distracted with things that don’t matter.”
Kaine said Harris has an effective message that she can use to counter claims by Republicans that she’s weak on the economy.
“So what you say is [the U.S. has] the lowest unemployment rate in a very long time,” Kaine said, “stock market nearly through the roof, so your 401k’s are doing well. The uninsured rate is the lowest it’s ever been in American history, manufacturing’s up, we’re doing infrastructure and building again. We’ve got more to do, but our economy is the strongest of any in the world coming out of COVID, and it’s because of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, who have embraced a make, build, growth philosophy. We’re going to make it here, we’re going to build it here and we’re going to grow it here.”
Meanwhile, Harris campaigned in Detroit and Pittsburgh with Biden, their first campaign events together since Harris replaced Biden at the top of the ticket.
Vice presidential candidate Tim Walz and his wife Gwen spent Labor Day in Milwaukee, The Hill reported.
Kaine said the message going into the home stretch of the campaign is this:
“The lasting message from today is, we’re in the home stretch,” Kaine said. “Virginia starts voting on Sept. 20, less than three weeks away, and we need everybody to be energized — the size of the crowd as well as the age of the crowd told me that we’ve got energy and we have unity.”