Democratic Vice Presidential nominee Kamala Harris speaks from George Washington University, Washington DC, August 27, 2020

Democratic Vice Presidential nominee Kamala Harris dissects Donald Trump’s leadership, saying he “has failed” with his “reckless disregard” for the US people during the Coronavirus pandemic which has killed more than 180,000 people.

Harris, a San Francisco prosecutor and California Attorney General, methodically took apart Trump’s response, from his praise of Chinese leader Xi Jinping on January 25 to his denial of the virus’s threat to his focus on the stock market with the demand for “reopening” as the pandemic surged.

Right at the moment we needed him to be tough on the Chinese government, he caved. Instead of rising to meet the most difficult moment of his presidency, Donald Trump froze. He was scared, and he was petty and he was vindictive.

He got it wrong from the beginning and then he got it wrong again and again and the consequences have been catastrophic.

Foreshadowing Trump’s speech on Thursday night at the White House, she called on him to address the “reality completely absent from this week’s Republican national convention”.

The Vice Presidential nominee opened her speech, from George Washington University, by addressing last Sunday’s shooting of James Blake by Wisconsin police and the issues of Black Lives Matter: “The shots fired at Mr Blake pierced the soul of our nation. It’s sickening to watch. It’s all too familiar. And it must end.”

See also EA on BBC: Jacob Blake Protests, The Conventions, and Hope v. Fear

Hours later, Trump delivered his remarks on the White House lawn to an audience of 1,000 with no social distancing and few wearing masks.

He referred only briefly to the “new and powerful invisible enemy” of Coronavirus, making unsupported declarations of succeeding and — unintentionally — alluding to his claim last week that the “Deep State” is preventing delivery of a vaccine to block his re-election:

We are meeting this challenge. We are delivering life-saving therapies and will produce a vaccine before the end of the year, or maybe even sooner. We will defeat the virus and the pandemic and emerge stronger than ever before.

Having belittled and ignored his medical and public health experts, having promoted cures from the unproven and dangerous drug hydroxychlorine to ingestion of disinfectant to ultaviolet light, having suppressed guidance to contain the virus, Trump proclaimed:

To save as many lives as possible, we are focusing on the science, the facts and the data.

The US death toll reached 180,814 on Thursday, with 1,071 fatalities in 24 hours. Confirmed cases are 5,866,053, an increase of 42,368.

“Violent Anarchists, Agitators, and Criminals”

Even before taking the state, Trump had defied federal law as well as Coronavirus by insisting on the setting of the White House lawn: the Hatch Act prohibits Executive Branch employees from engaging in or assisting political activity such as campaigns.

Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar responded bluntly:

Rather than addressing the “reality” laid out by Harris, Trump’s script was peppered with misinformation and falsehoods, and it continued his convention’s narrative of a culture of fear. He made no reference to the murder of George Floyd, the serious wounding of Jacob Blake, or the economic and social issues raised by this summer’s marches.

See also America Unfiltered on RTE and BBC: A Trump Convention “To Instill Fear”

In contrast to the “hope over fear, light over darkness” emphasis of last week’s Democratic convention, he declared:

This election will decide whether we save the American dream, or whether we allow a socialist agenda to demolish our cherished destiny.

Your vote will decide whether we protect law-abiding Americans, or whether we give free rein to violent anarchists, agitators, and criminals who threaten our citizens….

This election will decide whether we will defend the American way of life or whether we will allow a radical movement to completely dismantle and destroy it

Trump reworked reality to announce that his Wall with Mexico, a grail from his 2016 campaign, “will soon be complete”. In fact, only 30 new miles of barrier have been constructed along a border of almost 2,000 miles.

He said that, due to his threats, NATO had increased spending for the first time in 20 years. In fact, it did so in 2015 and 2016 during Barack Obama’s Presidency.

He repeated his oft-stated lie that he signed the Veterans’ Choice Act. In fact, Barack Obama signed it into law in 2014.

He sneered at Democratic Presidential nominee Joe Biden’s emphasis on compassion during a national crisis, deriding his “hollow words of empathy” for “laid off workers” In fact, manufacturing jobs declined during the Trump Adminstration even before the pandemic, and factories employed 733,000 fewer people in July than they did a year ago.

And he proclaimed, “Over the past three months, we have gained over 9 million jobs, a new record” — ignoring that this followed the loss of 22 million jobs since February, and that US GDP contracted 9.5% between April and June.

Diverting from his script as he concluded, Trump added one more lie to overturn the reality of his 2016 campaign’s cooperation with Russian interference in the election: “They spied on my campaign and they got caught.”

Harris: “A Better Path”

In her address, Harris anticipated and summarized her rival’s convention and him:

The Republican convention is designed for one purpose: to soothe Donald Trump’s ego, to make him feel good. But here’s the thing: he’s the president of the United States, and it’s not supposed to be about him. It’s supposed to be about the health and the safety and the well-being of the American people.

“On that measure, Donald Trump has failed….

We all know, he’s not changing. The President he has been is the President he will be.

But we have a chance to right these wrongs, and put America on a better path.