Amid chants of “Yes, she can!”, Barack Obama returned to the scene of past triumphs on Tuesday to pass the mantle of political history to Kamala Harris – and eviscerate her opponent Donald Trump.
The former US president delivered the closing speech on night two of the Democratic national convention in his home city of Chicago. Obama prompted raucous cheers as he delivered a withering critique of Trump, who succeeded him in the White House in 2017.
“We do not need four more years of bluster and bumbling and chaos,” he told delegates. “We have seen that movie before and we all know that the sequel is usually worse. America is ready for a new chapter. America is ready for a better story. We are ready for a President Kamala Harris.”
It was another night crackling with energy in the packed arena as America’s first Black president made the case for the nation to elect the first woman and first woman of colour to the Oval Office.
Obama was speaking 20 years after he first exploded on to the political stage at the Democratic convention in Boston. That summer, Harris helped host a fundraiser for Obama’s run for the US Senate in Illinois. Four years later, she backed him against Hillary Clinton in the presidential primary, a campaign in which he coined the phrase “Yes, we can!”
The same chant greeted Obama when he took the stage in Chicago just after 10pm ET on Thursday and embraced his wife, Michelle. But halfway through his speech, Obama broke from his teleprompter remarks to ad lib: “Yes, she can!” The crowd instinctively chanted, “Yes, she can!” in response.
There was a symbolic echo for Democrats who had come to fear that Obama’s election might be a historic aberration but now sense that it might in fact be Trump who represents the last gasp of a dying order.
In a nod to his debut at the 2004 convention, Obama, now 63, quipped: “I’m feeling hopeful because this convention has always been pretty good to kids with funny names who believe in a country where anything is possible.
“Because we have the chance to elect someone who’s spent her whole life trying to give people the same chances America gave her. Someone who sees you and hears you and will get up every single day and fight for you: the next President of the United States of America, Kamala Harris.”
The crowd roared its approval. Obama went on to pay tribute to outgoing president Joe Biden, who was not present, having delivered a valedictory address on Monday. “History will remember Joe Biden as a president who defended democracy at a moment of great danger,” he said. “I am proud to call him my president, but even prouder to call him my friend.”
The torch has been passed, he continued, but “for all the rallies and the memes”, the race for the White House remains tight. He suggested the people who will decide the election are asking a simple question: who will fight for them.
Obama opined that Trump, the Republican nominee, is not losing sleep over that question and highlighted his successor’s age – a point he might not have made if 81-year-old Biden were still in the contest.
“This is a 78-year-old billionaire who hasn’t stopped whining about his problems since he rode down his golden escalator nine years ago,” he said. “It’s been a constant stream of gripes and grievances that’s actually gotten worse now that he’s afraid of losing to Kamala.
“The childish nicknames and crazy conspiracy theories. This weird obsession with crowd sizes.” The crowd erupted. “It just goes on and on. The other day, I heard someone compare Trump to the neighbour who keeps running his leaf blower outside your window every minute of every day. From a neighbour, that’s exhausting. From a president, it’s just dangerous.”
Trump sees power as nothing more than a means to his ends, Obama said, accusing the former president of wanting another tax cut that helps his rich friends and of killing a bipartisan immigration deal because trying to solve the problem would hurt his campaign.
When delegates began to boo, Obama offered an old refrain: “Do not boo. Vote!”
Obama, whose breakthrough speech in 2004 had argued that there is not a liberal America and conservative America, only a United States of America, then Trump took to task for deliberately trying to turn Americans against one another.
He went on: “Most of all, Donald Trump wants us to think that this country is hopelessly divided between us and them; between the ‘real’ Americans who of course support him and the outsiders who don’t.
“And he wants you to think that you’ll be richer and safer if you will just give him the power to put those ‘other’ people back in their place. It’s one of the oldest tricks in politics – from a guy whose act has gotten pretty stale.”
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Notably, Obama did not dwell on a topic that was central to Biden’s candidacy: the notion that Trump poses an existential threat to democracy.
But he did draw a vivid contrast between Trump and Harris, describing her as “ready for the job” and “a person who has spent her life fighting on behalf of people who need a voice and a champion.
“She had to work for what she’s got, and she actually cares about what other people are going through. She’s not the neighbour running the leaf blower – she’s the neighbour rushing over to help when you need a hand.”
He praised her plans to solve America’s housing crisis, limit out of pocket healthcare costs, make college more affordable and look out for essential workers.
In a veiled dig at cancel culture, Obama also urged Democrats to show empathy to political opponents. “We need to remember that we’ve all got our blind spots and contradictions and prejudices; and that if we want to win over those who aren’t yet ready to support our candidate, we need to listen to their concerns – and maybe learn something in the process.”
The former president had been introduced by Michelle, the former first lady who delivered the most famous line of the 2016 convention when she said, “When they go low, we go high.” This time she electrified the hall with a new willingness to go after Trump.
She said: “For years, Donald Trump did everything in his power to try to make people fear us. See, his limited, narrow view of the world made him feel threatened by the existence of two hard working and highly educated, successful people who happen to be Black.”
Michelle also taunted Trump for his reference on the campaign trail to “Black jobs”, which he claims are being taken from Black people by migrants crossing into the US. “Who’s going to tell him that the job he’s currently seeking might just be one of those ‘Black jobs’?” she asked, sending the crowd wild.
Tuesday night also witnessed a roll call of delegates confirming the nomination of Harris and running mate Tim Walz, both of whom held a rally in Milwaukee in the battleground state of Wisconsin.
In a speech to the convention Harris’s husband, Doug Emhoff, said he “just fell in love fast” with her, adding that she finds “joy in pursuing justice” and “stands up to bullies”.
Bernie Sanders, an independent senator for Vermont who ran for the Democratic nomination in 2016 and 2020, set out a policy wish list including getting big money out of the political process, guaranteeing healthcare to all as a human right and raising the minimum wage. “I look forward to working with Kamala and Tim to pass this agenda,” he said.