(WILMINGTON, Del.) — Vice President Kamala Harris officially accepted President Joe Biden’s endorsement and held an event at her campaign office headquarters in Wilmington, Delaware on Monday.
“It is my intention to go out and earn this nomination and to win,” Harris said after taking a moment to thank her predecessor for his “bold and visionary leadership.”
Biden, who had just finished giving remarks of his own to campaign staffers after stepping down from the race Sunday afternoon, told the team that although he is no longer on the ticket, he’s not going anywhere.
“I want you to know, I won’t be on a ticket, but I’m still going to be fully, fully engaged. I’ve got six months left of my presidency. I’m determined to get as much done as I possibly can both foreign policy and domestic policy,” Biden said.
The president continued, promising to “always have their back.”
“I’m not going anywhere. I want you to know you’ve always had my back. I promise you. I will always have your back,” he said.
Harris picked up the baton where Biden dropped it off, heavily going after former President Donald Trump. Her new campaign has begun framing the race as a fight between a prosecutor — Harris served as California Attorney General — and a criminal.
“As many of you know, before I was elected as Vice President, before I was elected as a United States senator, I was the elected attorney general, as I’ve mentioned, to California. Before that, I was a courtroom prosecutor. In those roles, I took on perpetrators of all kinds,” Harris said. “Predators who abused women, fraudsters who ripped off consumers, cheaters, who broke the rules for their own gain. So, hear me when I say I know Donald Trump’s type.”
“And in this campaign, I will proudly put my record against his,” she said.
Voters have told ABC News that this election feels like it’s more of a vote against Trump than for Biden. Harris told staffers it’s more than “us versus Trump.”
“This campaign is not just about us versus Donald Trump,” she said. “Our campaign has always been about two different versions of what we see as the future of the country… one focused on the future, the other focused on the past. Donald Trump wants to take our country backward to a time before many of our fellow Americans had full freedoms and rights.”
Staffers were told Sunday night that they would keep their jobs, and on Monday, it was announced that former campaign co-chair Jennifer O’Malley Dillon would stay on to run the campaign.
Harris ended her remarks by fervently telling staffers that this team was perfectly poised to win in November: “When we fight, we win!”
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