Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - July 29, 2024, Winnipeg, Manitoba A4 ● WINNIPEGFREEPRESS.COM NEWS I WORLD MONDAY, JULY 29, 2024 Harris campaign calls Trump’s remarks ‘a vow to end democracy’ D EMOCRATIC lawmakers and Vice President Kamala Harris’s cam- paign joined a chorus of online critics in calling out remarks Donald Trump aimed at a Christian audience on Friday, arguing that the former president and current Republican presidential nominee had implied he would end elections in the United States if he won a second term. At the conclusion of his speech at the Believers Summit in West Palm Beach, Fla., Trump said, “Christians, get out and vote, just this time. You won’t have to do it anymore. … You got to get out and vote. In four years, you don’t have to vote again. We’ll have it fixed so good you’re not going to have to vote.” Democrats and others interpreted the comments as signalling how a second Trump presidency would be run, a re- minder that he previously said he would not be a dictator upon returning to of- fice “except for Day One.” Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who is running for Senate, shared the clip of Trump’s speech on X, writing, “This year democracy is on the ballot, and if we are to save it, we must vote against authoritarianism. Here Trump help- fully reminds us that the alternative is never having the chance to vote again.” Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) called Trump’s comments “terrifying.” And Rep. Dan Goldman (D-N.Y.) said, “The only way ‘you won’t have to vote any- more’ is if Donald Trump becomes a dictator.” The Trump campaign, however, says the comments, made at the event host- ed by the conservative group Turning Point Action, were about how Trump would unite the country. Asked to clari- fy what Trump meant, Steven Cheung, a spokesperson for the campaign, said in a statement on Saturday that the former president “was talking about uniting this country and bringing pros- perity to every American, as opposed to the divisive political environment that has sowed so much division and even resulted in an assassination attempt.” Trump, who has continued to assert without evidence that the 2020 elec- tion was rigged against him, preced- ed his comments about not having to vote again by telling the audience that Democrats “don’t want to approve voter ID — that’s because they want to cheat. But until then, Republicans must win. … We want a landslide that’s too big to rig.” The Harris campaign is calling Trump’s remarks “a vow to end democ- racy.” “When Vice President Harris says this election is about freedom she means it,” Harris campaign spokes- person James Singer said in a news release on Saturday. “Our democracy is under assault by criminal Donald Trump: After the last election Trump lost, he sent a mob to overturn the re- sults. This campaign, he has promised violence if he loses, the end of our elec- tions if he wins, and the termination of the Constitution to empower him to be a dictator to enact his dangerous Pro- ject 2025 agenda on America.” (Project 2025 is a think tank document outlining policy priorities for the next Republic- an president. Many Trump allies and former administration officials were involved in drafting the document, but his campaign has sought to distance the former president from it.) Trump’s comments also drew some concern among those on the Christian right. David Lane, an organizer of conserv- ative Christian pastors, said Trump “may have gotten a little over his skis” with what he said because it could dis- courage conservative Christians from shaping the outcomes of future elec- tions. “Evangelicals in 2028, 2032 and 2036 must raise their civics game to a new level if America is to return to the Judeo-Christian heritage and Biblical-based culture laid out by the founders,” said Lane, the founder of the American Renewal Project, whose mission is to help elect more Christians to office. He added that “somebody’s values will reign supreme in the public square,” and if Christians don’t vote, their values will not be reflected in their elected officials. In front of a different Christian audi- ence last month, Trump made a similar suggestion about Christians not need- ing to vote after this year’s election. At a Faith and Freedom Coalition event in Washington, the former presi- dent said Christians “don’t vote as much as they should.” “Do you know the power you have if you would vote? … You’ve got to get out and vote, just this time. I don’t care — in four years, you don’t have to vote, okay? In four years, don’t vote,” he said. “I don’t care by that time, but we’ll have it all straightened out, so it’ll be much different.” But if Democrats were to come into power, he said at the time, “they’ll ruin it [and] we’ll have to do this all over again.” Erica De Bruin, a professor of gov- ernment at Hamilton College whose research focuses on civil-military re- lations, civil war and policing, said, “Trump frequently makes these kinds of deliberately ambiguous statements that can be interpreted in multiple ways.” But she added that “to understand what another Trump presidency would involve, I think it is more useful to look at his past behaviour than to attempt to parse what might be the ‘true mean- ing’ of any individual set of remarks he makes.” She pointed out that the last time he was in office, “he attempted to subvert the outcome of an election and remain in power longer than the Amer- ican public voted to keep him there.” Steven Levitsky, a professor of gov- ernment at Harvard University, and co-author of Tyranny of the Minority: Why American Democracy Reached the Breaking Point, also said that while he didn’t think Trump’s recent comment was “indicative of an organ- ized plot to end elections in the United States,” it did represent yet another sign that “the guy has got authoritarian reflexes.” “Over the course of 10 or 15 years,” Levitsky added, a growing number of Republicans “convinced themselves that they weren’t going to be able to win elections in this new, multiracial Amer- ica. I’m not so sure that’s true, but they were deeply fearful that was true. And so Trump, I think more than anything else, he senses… where they’re going and they’re feeling.” Christian conservatives — White evangelicals, specifically — make up a substantial part of the voter base that Trump has been courting since his 2016 campaign. In both 2016 and 2020, a third of Trump’s support came from White evangelical Protestants. So 1 one in every 3 votes Trump received came from White evangelical Protestants, a group that the Religion Research Insti- tute estimates constitutes 14 per cent of the population. Levitsky’s co-author, Daniel Ziblatt, also a professor of government at Har- vard, put a finer point on the signifi- cance of Trump’s comment. “I can’t think of a major candidate for office in any democracy on Earth since at least World War II who speaks in such overt- ly authoritarian ways,” said Ziblatt. “Not Victor Orban in Hungary, not Re- cep Erdogan in Turkey. Nowhere.” Jennifer Mercieca, a communica- tions professor at Texas A&M Univer- sity and author of Demagogue for Presi- dent: The Rhetorical Genius of Donald Trump, said she interpreted Trump’s comment as an attempt to address the “double bind” that supposed “strong- men” leaders face. “They narrate a world of chaos and promise that they are strong enough to fix it in order to win elections, but they frequently don’t actually solve the prob- lems that they’ve said that they could easily solve if given power,” said Mer- cieca, whose research focuses on the relationship between democracy and American communication practices. “I think Trump is here promising Christians that he will actually solve the problems that he has promised them he’ll solve (a full abortion ban … and various ‘culture war’ issues) and so with all of the problems solved, they won’t feel like the world is so chaotic that they have to vote to save the na- tion.” “It’s a big promise,” she added, “and he doesn’t give specific details here.” — The Washington Post MAEGAN VAZQUEZ, SARAH ELLISON Democrats criticize former president’s message directed at Christian audience ALEX BRANDON / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump wraps up a campaign rally Saturday in St. Cloud, Minn. Harris raises US$200M in first week of campaign WASHINGTON — Vice President Ka- mala Harris’ campaign has raised US$200 million since she emerged as the likely Democratic presidential nom- inee last week, an eye-popping haul in her race against the Republican nom- inee, former president Donald Trump. The campaign, which announced its latest fundraising total on Sunday, said the bulk of the donations — 66 per cent — comes from first-time con- tributors in the 2024 election cycle and were made after President Joe Biden announced his exit from the race and endorsed Harris. Over 170,000 volunteers have also signed up to help the Harris campaign with phone banking, canvassing and other get-out-the-vote efforts. Election Day is 100 days away. “The momentum and energy for Vice President Harris is real — and so are the fundamentals of this race: this elec- tion will be very close and decided by a small number of voters in just a few states,” Michael Tyler, the campaign’s communications director, wrote in a memo. Her campaign said it held some 2,300 organizing events in battleground states this weekend as several high-pro- file Democrats under consideration to serve as Harris’ running mate stumped for her. Harris campaigned in Pittsfield, Mass., on Saturday, drawing hundreds to a fundraiser that had been organ- ized when Biden was still at the top of the Democratic ticket. The fundraiser had originally been expected to raise US$400,000 but ended bringing in about US$1.4 million, according to the campaign. Mandy Robbins, 45, of Decatur, Ga., drove to one of those organizing events Sunday in the northern suburbs of Atlanta to hear Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, a potential Harris running mate. She thought Biden did a “great job” in the White House, but acknowledged she “would not have been nearly this excit- ed” if he remained in the race. “I finally feel hopeful now,” Robbins said. She added, “We can win this with Harris.” Beshear spoke from experience to supporters, telling them their work could be the difference in what’s ex- pected to be a close race. Beshear won his 2019 campaign by a margin of about 5,000 votes of 1.41 million ballots cast. He was reelected in November by a relatively comfortable margin. “Every door knock mattered. Every phone call mattered. Every difficult conversation that people had with their uncle at Thanksgiving mattered,” Beshear said of his 2019 race. “Every- one here today that signs up to volun- teer … you might be the difference in winning this race for Vice President Harris.” Meanwhile, Trump, running mate Sen. J.D. Vance and their surrogates stepped up efforts to frame Harris as a far-left politician out of touch with the American mainstream. Vance said after a stop at a diner in Waite Park, Min., on Sunday that Har- ris has “got a little bit of a bump from her introduction” but predicted it would soon dissipate. “Look, the people are going to learn her record,” Vance said. “They’re going to learn that she’s a radical. They’re go- ing to learn that she’s basically a San Francisco liberal who wants to take San Francisco policies to the entire country.” Vance was echoing Trump, who in a campaign appearance with Vance in St. Cloud, Minnesota on Saturday, called Harris a “crazy liberal,” accused her of wanting to “defund the police” and said she was an “absolute radical” on abortion. Harris, a vocal proponent of abortion rights, has made clear that she will make Republican-backed efforts to restrict reproductive rights a key plank in her campaign. “There is no liberal horse that she has chosen not to ride,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. Trump backer Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., also tried to brand Harris as a full partner for “a lot of the worst deci- sions of the Biden administration,” in- cluding the chaotic August 2021 pullout of U.S. troops led to the swift collapse of the Afghan government and military. Cotton also accused Harris of em- boldening Iranian proxies Hamas and Hezbollah by pressing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over civilian casualties in the war in Gaza. Netanyahu met separately with Har- ris and Biden at the White House on Thursday. Afterward, Harris said she urged Netanyahu to reach a cease- fire deal soon with the militant group Hamas so that dozens of hostages held by the militants in Gaza since Oct. 7 can return home. Harris said she also affirmed Israel’s right to defend itself but expressed deep concern about the high death toll in Gaza and the “dire” humanitarian situation there. — The Associated Press Two meteor showers will flash across the sky around same time in late July GET ready for a meteor shower double- header. The Southern Delta Aquariid meteor shower peaks in late July. And this year, it will coincide with a second smaller meteor shower, the Alpha Capricornids. The Delta Aquariids occur every year in North America’s late summer. This year’s peak activity happens ear- ly Tuesday morning, with an expected 15 to 20 meteors visible per hour in the Northern Hemisphere, under dark skies. Viewing should be even better in the Southern Hemisphere. The shower lasts through August 21, according to the American Meteor Society. Around the same time, the Alpha Capricornid meteor shower should pro- duce around five meteors per hour and lasts through August 15. What is a meteor shower? Multiple meteor showers occur annu- ally and you don’t need special equip- ment to see them. Most meteor showers originate from the debris of comets. The source of the Delta Aquariids is thought to be from the comet 96P/Machholz. The Alpha Capricornids originate from the comet 169P/NEAT. When rocks from space enter Earth’s atmosphere, the resistance from the air makes them very hot. This causes the air to glow around them and briefly leaves a fiery tail behind them — the end of a “shooting star.” The glowing pockets of air around fast-moving space rocks, ranging from the size of a dust particle to a boulder, may be visible in the night sky. These two meteor showers are not high volume, but the Alpha Capri- cornids often produces very bright meteors, said University of Warwick astronomer Don Pollacco. For skygazers, “one bright one is worth 20 faint ones,” he said. How to view a meteor shower Meteor showers are usually most visible between midnight and predawn hours. It’s easier to see shooting stars under dark skies, away from city lights. Me- teor showers also appear brightest on cloudless nights when the moon wanes smallest. And your eyes will better adapted to seeing meteors if you aren’t checking your phone. “It ruins your night vision,” said NASA’s Bill Cooke. The Southern Hemisphere will have the best view of Delta Aquariids. Co- inciding with a waning moon around 30 per cent full means the clearest view- ing will happen after midnight. When is the next meteor shower? The meteor society keeps an updated list of upcoming large meteor showers, including the peak viewing days and moonlight conditions. The next major meteor shower will be the Perseids, peaking in mid-August. — The Associated Press CHRISTINA LARSON ;