ATLANTA — Brian Ramirez is voting for Vice President Harris — even canvassing for her. But he’s not loving what she’s been saying as she tries to persuade moderate Republicans and independent voters in the final days of the campaign.
Harris has been courting voters outside the traditional Democratic coalition to try to win tight races in swing states by appealing to their concerns about former President Donald Trump.
But the strategy has dampened enthusiasm among some progressives, who feel she’s tacked too far right.
“It just hurts, when she says, ‘I’ll have Republicans in my cabinet’ or she’s campaigning with Liz Cheney,” said Ramirez, who works with the Georgia Youth Justice Coalition, and was part of a small group of grassroots organizers that NPR convened last week.
“When she speaks on the border, she speaks a lot on drugs, crime — that kind of thing — when it’s much more than that,” said Ramirez, who previously was undocumented.
They’re still voting for her, but they’re not feeling great about it
In the homestretch of the campaign, Harris has leaned hard into describing the former president as a threat to democracy, echoing Trump’s former chief of staff who described him as fascist.
Progressives also think Trump is dangerous, said Joseph Geevarghese, executive director of Our Revolution, a group that grew out of Sen. Bernie Sanders’ 2016 campaign. But he doesn’t think that argument alone is enough to seal the deal. He’s worried that some progressives won’t vote at all, or are considering third parties, he said.
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