Ground Game: Harris eyes the debate, ‘joy’ as campaign message, Walz the teacher

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Plus, campaigns project contrasting tones, and his former high school students recall Walz’s support{beacon}

By Meg Kinnard

August 12, 2024 08:45:18 AM

By Meg Kinnard

August 12, 2024 08:45:18 AM

  

Vice President Kamala Harris has repeatedly taunted former President Donald Trump’s seeming reluctance to debate her. Now that a Sept. 10 matchup is set, sharing a stage with Trump presents a critical choice for Harris to define herself and her opponent in a truncated campaign, and it also sets up a major test – one that President Joe Biden failed badly enough that he ended his campaign and made way for her.

Welcome to this week’s edition of AP Ground Game.

 

THE HEADLINES

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris arrives to speak at a campaign rally, Saturday, Aug. 10, 2024, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/Julia Nikhinson)

A look at Harris the debater

A former San Francisco district attorney and California attorney general, Harris has long presented her debating prowess as a strength, and her sharp questioning of opponents has produced many a career highlight. But she has also had testy exchanges that didn’t play as well.

Perhaps the pinnacle of Harris' short-lived 2020 presidential campaign was a broadside against Biden, who later made her his running mate anyway. She seized on Biden opposing busing to integrate public schools in the 1970s by describing a young girl who boarded such buses before offering, “That little girl was me.”

But a low moment of Harris' same campaign came at a subsequent debate. Another rival, former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, launched a lengthy