Harris escalates criticism of Trump, calling conviction ‘disqualifying’

Donald Trump’s behavior should disqualify him for the presidency, Vice President Kamala Harris is expected to tell a state Democratic Party dinner in Detroit on Saturday night, in one of her first campaign appearances since the former president’s historic criminal conviction.

In excerpts of planned remarks to attendees, Harris makes her most direct public criticism yet of Trump’s false claims of his New York trial being rigged — drawing a line between his “attacks” on the justice system and his attempts to discredit the 2020 election.

"You know why he complains? Because the reality is, cheaters don’t like getting caught,” read the excerpts, shared with the press pool.

Harris, who has long highlighted her prosecutorial record and service as California attorney general on the campaign trail, outlines in the remarks how a jury made a unanimous decision to convict the former president on 34 counts of falsifying business records. She notes that Trump’s defense was able to participate in selecting both jurors and witnesses, in a rebuke of his allegations that he was not treated fairly.

The deployment of Harris as the highest-ranking official to prosecute Democrats’ case against Trump’s criminal record is a sign that the party is increasingly willing to highlight his conviction in the same breath as other key matters facing Americans.

The planned remarks echo Harris’ reaction to Trump’s guilty verdict during an appearance on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” on Tuesday, where she said that Americans “want to know that there is a president who believes they are accountable to the people” — and who can reliably take on the cost of insulin, the pharmaceutical industry and high drug prices.

"Simply put, Donald Trump thinks he is above the law,” Harris says in the excerpts. “This should be disqualifying for anyone who wants to be President of the United States."

The excerpts also include Harris denouncing the “lies” that the Biden administration was controlling the outcome of Trump’s case — a state prosecution — and a reference to Trump’s warnings that he might use a second term to seek revenge on his political enemies.

Harris is expected at the dinner in Detroit as part of her third visit to Michigan this year, where she also visited Ann Arbor for an event with the Biden Victory Fund hosted by top Democratic donors, according to the press pool. Trump has made three visits to the state so far in 2024.

Michigan — a state where just tens of thousands of voters could mean the difference between a second term for Biden or Trump — is key to the president’s reelection prospects. But the two candidates are polling neck-and-neck in the state, and both have reason for concern about their standing. Trump faces a significant subset of moderate Republicans who were opposed to his candidacy in the Michigan primaries, while Biden has faced tensions with the state’s large Arab American population — which has criticized his foreign policy on Israel and Gaza.