US election: ‘Republicans for Harris’ campaign launched

FILE PHOTO: Vice President Kamala Harris boards Air Force Two as she departs Westfield-Barnes Regional Airport in Westfield, Mass., Saturday, July 27, 2024. Harris is returning to Washington after participating in a political event in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. (Associated Press Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough, Pool)

WASHINGTON — Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign on Sunday was launching “Republicans for Harris” as she looks to win over Republican voters put off by Donald Trump’s candidacy.

The program will be a “campaign within a campaign,” according to Harris’ team, using well-known Republicans to activate their networks, with a particular emphasis on primary voters who backed former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley. The program will kick off with events this week in Arizona, North Carolina and Pennsylvania. Republicans backing Harris will also appear at rallies with the vice president and her soon-to-be-named running mate this coming week, the campaign said.

The Harris campaign shared the details of the program first with The Associated Press before the official announcement.

Her team is trying to create “a permission structure” for GOP voters who would otherwise have a difficult time voting for Harris. The effort will rely heavily on Republican-to-Republican voter contact, with the belief that the best way to get a Republican to vote for Harris is to hear directly from another Republican making the same choice.

Trump’s “extremism is toxic to the millions of Republicans who no longer believe the party of Donald Trump represents their values” and will vote against him again in November, said Harris’ national director of Republican outreach, Austin Weatherford. He said the campaign would be “showing up and taking the time every single day to earn the vote of Republicans who believe in putting country over party and know that every American deserves a president who will protect their freedoms and a commander in chief who will put the best interests of the American people above their own.”

READ: Harris attacks Trump’s ‘extremist’ agenda in speech to teachers

Weatherford is a onetime chief of staff to former Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., who had endorsed the Biden-Harris ticket before President Joe Biden’s disastrous debate performance against Trump. Kinzinger is backing Harris once more as part of the launch.

“As a proud conservative, I never thought I’d be endorsing a Democrat for President,” he said in a statement. “But, I know Vice President Harris will defend our democracy and ensure Donald Trump never returns to the White House.”

Kinzinger developed a national profile as one of two Republicans on the House committee that investigated the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. The committee highlighted a number of Trump’s transgressions before and during the deadly attack as Congress tried to certify the results of the 2020 election that Biden won over Trump.

Trump has done little to try to win over moderate Republican voters and on Saturday criticized anew Republican Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, who rebuffed Trump’s attempts to overturn the 2020 election in the battleground state.

Last month, when Biden was still at the top of the ticket, the campaign went out with an ad highlighting former Trump staffers’ criticism of their onetime boss. A separate ad highlighted Trump’s often-personal attacks against Haley, including his primary nickname of her as “birdbrain” and suggestion that “she’s not presidential timber.”

READ: ‘Say it to my face,’ Harris dares Trump as White House battle deepens

Hundreds of thousands of registered Republicans voted in primaries for Haley even after she ended her bid for the 2024 Republican nomination and as Trump trounced her in almost every contest.

Haley in May announced she would vote for Trump and appeared at last month’s Republican National Convention.

The Harris campaign’s effort includes former Govs. Bill Weld of Massachusetts and Christine Todd Whitman of New Jersey, former Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, former Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, and 16 former Republican members of Congress, including Kinzinger and Reps. Joe Walsh of Illinois and Susan Molinari of New York. All have been notable critics of Trump in the past.

Former Trump press secretary Stephanie Grisham is also endorsing Harris.

“I might not agree with Vice President Kamala Harris on everything, but I know that she will fight for our freedom, protect our democracy and represent America with honor and dignity on the world stage,” Grisham said in a statement.