(CHICAGO) — Former President Barack Obama’s highly anticipated speech at the Democratic National Convention stage on Tuesday night is expected to be a full-circle moment between him and Vice President Kamala Harris as he plans to champion her experience and make the case that she is the best person for the job.
Over the last few months, Barack and former first lady Michelle Obama have been in close contact with the vice president and supported her campaign in any way they are able, a source familiar with the matter told ABC News.
In Tuesday’s address, Obama will affirm why Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz are the leaders the country needs right now, a source familiar with the speech told ABC News. He will lay out the task in front of Democrats over the next eleven weeks, and bring into focus the values at stake in this election and at the heart of our politics, according to the source.
The speech is expected to touch on Harris and Obama’s 20 years of friendship and political camaraderie with Harris. The two met at a fundraiser back when Obama was vying for the Illinois seat in the Senate and Harris was the San Francisco district attorney.
When then-Sen. Obama was running for president in 2008, Harris was one of his early supporters in that year’s Democratic primary. In fact, she was on the ground in Iowa in December 2007 knocking on doors to advocate on Obama’s behalf to caucus voters.
Harris talked about her dedication to Obama’s campaign at a 2019 presidential campaign event, recalling a moment when a caucus voter told her “They’re not gonna let him win.”
“And I stepped back in my mind and I looked at what I was looking at,” she said at a 2019 Des Moines event. “Which over the course of at least 85 years, all the indignities, all the injustices, that she has experienced and witnessed, and at that age of life, she wasn’t about to go through experiencing another disappointment or indignity. And so, me being me, I decided well I am not leaving here.”
Harris recalled talking with the voter longer and eventually saw her at the polls the next day.
“So, we know that when we don’t sit back and wait for somebody else to give us permission to tell us what is possible, we make what is possible, possible. We make it happen,” she said.
Obama endorsed Harris in 2010 when she ran for California attorney general and appeared at a rally in Los Angeles where he called her “a dear, dear friend.”
“I want everybody to do right by her,” he told the crowd.
Harris would speak at the 2012 Democratic National Convention and continued to make her case for Obama.
“President Obama stood with me and 48 other attorneys general in taking on the banks and winning $25 billion for struggling homeowners. That’s leadership,” she said. “That’s what President Obama did. And that’s why we need to give him another four years”
In 2013, Obama spoke highly of Harris at a fundraiser in California, but his comments got him in hot water at the time.
“She is brilliant and she is dedicated and she is tough, and she is exactly what you’d want in anybody who is administering the law, and making sure that everybody is getting a fair shake. She also happens to be by far the best-looking attorney general in the country,” he said.
The comment on Harris’ looks sparked a backlash for being sexist and inappropriate, and he apologized the next day.
Obama would continue to support Harris as she ran for U.S. Senate in 2016 and later Joe Biden’s running mate on the 2020 presidential ticket.
The former president and former first lady have been in regular touch with Harris over the years, providing counsel and being a sounding board, too, a source familiar with the Obamas told ABC News.
On July 26, five days after President Joe Biden dropped out of the presidential race, the Obamas officially endorsed Harris.
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