Harris says she’s ready if Trump tries to declare victory prematurely

WASHINGTON — Vice President Kamala Harris said Tuesday that her team is prepared to challenge Donald Trump if he tries to prematurely declare victory in the 2024 election — but she is first focused on defeating the Republican nominee.

Harris spoke to NBC News just two weeks before Election Day, as part of a media campaign aimed at making her closing argument in front of as many persuadable voters as possible. She said she was not concerned about the role sexism could play in the election, as she would be the first woman elected to the White House, and again defended President Joe Biden’s fitness for office.

Harris said Democrats “have the resources and the experience” if Trump tries to subvert the election.

“This is a person, Donald Trump, who tried to undo – a free and fair election, who still denies the will of the people, who incited a violent mob to attack the United States Capitol and about 140 law enforcement officers were attacked. Some – were killed. This is a very serious matter,” she said.

Trump has been criminally charged with trying to overturn the 2020 election and refuses to admit he lost to President Joe Biden. After a failed legal effort to overturn the results, a mob of Trump supporters rioted at the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, attacking authorities in an effort to stop the certification of the race.

At Harris’ rallies, some of her supporters chant “Lock him up,” something Trump used to say about his former Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton. Harris often responds: “The courts will handle that. We will take care of November.”

At a campaign stop on Tuesday, Biden said, “We have to arrest him,” but Biden quickly added, “Arrest him politically. Lock him outside, that’s what we have to do.”

“No president has ever been like this guy,” Biden said. “He is a genuine threat to our democracy.”

Speaking to supporters on Tuesday, Trump criticized Harris for spending the day conducting interviews, appearing to try to sow distrust in the election. “She knows something we don’t know,” he said. “I think she knows some kind of outcome that we don’t.”

While partisan battles over voting rules have long been a part of presidential campaigns, election litigation has soared in recent years. With money pouring in for legal fights and the number of outside groups involved in election disputes proliferating, the disputes are not likely to slow down anytime soon.

Harris told NBC that she is not focused on pointing out the historic nature of her candidacy, saying, “I’m clearly a woman, I don’t need to point that out to anyone.”

She added that she is not worried about sexism hurting her candidacy, saying she is focused on speaking to all voters.

“I will never assume that anyone in our country should elect a leader based on their gender or race, rather that that leader needs to win the vote based on substance and what they will do to meet challenges and inspire people ,” she said. .

The vice president also defended Biden, whose disastrous debate against Trump forced him to abandon his reelection campaign and paved the way for her to become the Democratic presidential nominee.

Harris said she still believes Biden is “in every way capable” of being president, saying “you’d have to ask him if that’s the only reason” he dropped out of the race, but she has “no reluctance” to say that he is ready for work.