VP Kamala Harris voices optimism for America in closing message to Michigan voters

EAST LANSING — Vice President Kamala Harris delivered her closing argument to Michigan voters Sunday inside a raucous building full of MSU students, describing an optimistic and hopeful vision of the nation that contrasts sharply with former President Donald Trump's dire warnings of pending world war and a nation in decline.

"We see our fellow American not as an enemy, but as a neighbor," the Democratic presidential nominee said to loud roars.

"We have the opportunity in this election to finally turn the page on a decade of politics driven by fear and division," she said. "America is ready for a fresh start," and "a new generation of leadership," said Harris, who turned 60 in October but is still nearly two decades younger than Trump, 78, and President Joe Biden, who turns 82 this month.

Harris said she sees "the promise of America in all the young leaders that are here."

Harris campaigned in three cities in the key battleground state of Michigan and is planning to spend Monday campaigning in Pennsylvania, also a critical swing state. She spent Sunday in Michigan appealing to two key constituencies — Black voters in Detroit and Pontiac and young voters at MSU.

MSU Fire Marshal Thomas Miller told the Free Press Sunday the crowd inside the Jenison Field House was about 6,500, which he said was the maximum he would allow for safety reasons. Built in 1940, the barn-shaped structure is the former home of Spartans Basketball. On Sunday, it was ringed with huge green and white banners reading, "Vote for Freedom," and, "A President for All." Another large crowd watched the event on screens set up outside.

Polls published Sunday continued to show Harris and Trump, the Republican nominee, within the margin of polling error both in Michigan and nationally, and it was not clear exactly how soon a winner would be declared after voting concluded Tuesday night.

Trump, meanwhile, planned to hold his final campaign event late Monday night in Grand Rapids, as he has in the two previous presidential elections.

"Today is Kamala Harris' last chance to gaslight Michiganders into thinking that the last four years haven't been an ultimate failure," said Victoria LaCivita, a Michigan spokeswoman for the Trump campaign, which has hammered the Biden administration over inflation and undocumented migrants crossing the Mexico-U.S. border. "But Michigan voters know better."

Sunday was the 16th day Harris spent in Michigan this year, though she made four visits before launching her presidential campaign in August. Trump was in Warren on Friday, speaking at Macomb Community College, and his Grand Rapids rally late Monday will mark his 17th day in Michigan in 2024.

Sunday was also the last day of early voting in Michigan before Election Day on Tuesday. According to the Michigan Secretary of State's Office, close to 3 million ballots had been cast in Michigan as of Sunday afternoon.

Samantha Thomas, a Lansing resident and business administration senior at Ferris State University, was among the thousands of people waiting in line Sunday afternoon to enter the venue at MSU.

It's the second presidential election for Thomas but "this is my first rally," she said.

Thomas said she already voted by mail and reproductive rights and other women's rights are the most important issues to her in the election.

"I just want to have my freedom and express my voice through my vote," she said.

Polls show Trump is doing well among young white males. Asked whether she has seen evidence of that among her peers, Thomas said she tends to socialize with people who have similar political views to her own. But based on TV media interviews she has seen or read about with young white males who are Trump supporters, she feels some of them "make things up," or "take things way out of proportion."

Jaylen Baker, a senior in communications at MSU and a first-time voter, was also waiting in line outside the Jenison Field House.

Baker said there is a "trope of masculinity" that surrounds the Trump campaign and he believes the campaign intentionally employs certain verbiage that plays on certain masculine stereotypes to appeal to young white males.

But based on his own research, Baker said, he feels confident heading into Election Day. "There's a lot of Democratic support for Harris," and "a lot of blue dots out there," on the national map, he said.

Baker said one of the most important election issues to him is combatting disinformation.

Harris spent much of Sunday in metro Detroit, working to pump up Black support after flying into Michigan from New York following a brief and previously unannounced appearance on "Saturday Night Live."

At Greater Emmanuel Institutional Church of God in Christ in northwest Detroit, Harris quoted scripture and spoke of going to church as a child in Oakland, Calif., with her sister.

More: Crowds line up hours ahead of Kamala Harris rally at Michigan State in East Lansing

"God has a plan for us, good plans for us, plans that will bring us together as a nation," she told the congregation, which cheered her on. "(But) It is not enough to believe in these plans, we must act."

"We have two days until we decide the fate of our nation," she said.

Harris also met with diners at Kuzzo's Chicken & Waffles on Livernois in Detroit, taking selfies and shaking hands with a crowd that included Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan before holding a brief discussion at a traditionally Black barbershop in Pontiac.

Asked if she had a closing message to Michigan's large Arab-American and Muslim community, many members of which are angry that Harris and President Joe Biden haven't demanded an immediate cease-fire in Gaza and ordered an Israeli arms embargo, the vice president said she has the support of "many who represent the interests and the concerns also of the Arab American community, but I also know, well enough, it is not a monolith."

"On the subject of Gaza, I have been very clear, the level of death of innocent Palestinians is unconscionable," she said. "We need to end the war, and we need to get the hostages out, and as president of the United States, I will do everything in my power to achieve that end, and a two-state solution, where Palestinians will have the right to self-determination and security and stability in the region."

"But again, the issues (that concern the communities' members) are as varied as they are for any voter… These are issues that resonate in that community, as well as every other community, and I will continue to speak to members of that community, and to ask for their vote, which I hope I earn."

MSU is also located inside the congressional district of what is seen as a key race nationally between Democrat Curtis Hertel Jr., of East Lansing, and Republican Tom Barrett, of Charlotte. Both are former state senators. Hertel addressed the large crowd Sunday.

On Oct. 28, Harris held another large rally near the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.

Contact Paul Egan: 517-372-8660 or [email protected]. Follow him on X, @paulegan4.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: VP Harris voices optimism for America in closing message to Michigan