Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks as her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, looks on during a campaign event in Philadelphia on August 6.
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Vice President Harris and her running mate, Tim Walz, are back on their campaign bus. The two are on the campaign trail together for the first time since last week’s Democratic convention. This time, they’re leaving Wednesday for a two-day bus tour of Georgia.
Their trip will take them to parts of the state that don’t always get the attention of Democratic politicians. It will also be the site of Harris’ first major interview on network television since becoming her party’s presidential nominee on Thursday.
The attention this week is just the latest sign that Georgia, a state President Biden narrowly won in 2020, is in play again this election year.
According to the campaign, Harris and Walz will begin and end their bus tour in Savannah, with stops in urban, rural and suburban communities, including areas with large numbers of black voters and working-class families.
“This area is a priority for the campaign: we have nearly 50 full-time staffers in seven offices in South Georgia,” said Porsha White, Harris’ Georgia state campaign director. “This will be the first time a general election candidate has campaigned in Savannah since the 1990s.”
It’s part of a broader strategy to reach voters in traditionally Republican areas of key states.
Savannah, like most big cities, votes heavily Democratic. But it’s swimming in a sea of Republicans, and that’s what Harris and Walz will campaign on.
“The goal is to outperform,” said Andra Gillespie, a political scientist at Emory University. “So you have to outperform not only with your base, but also in areas where you’ve been historically weak.”
That means campaigning away from the Democratic strongholds of Atlanta, Philadelphia and Charlotte, North Carolina, to narrow margins in parts of those competitive key states that have typically voted Republican. In other words, losing by less of a margin.
In Georgia, where Republican voters still outnumber Democratic voters, this is really the only way to have a chance of winning.
“Democrats also want to do better than they have historically done in other parts of the state, so you want to be able to run stronger margins — even if they lose margins — in other parts of the state,” Gillespie said.
Both campaigns have invested time and money in Georgia
In presidential campaigns, two important indicators of how campaigns view their chances in a state: time and money. Since Harris entered the race, Trump and his allies have spent nearly $33 million on ads in the state, mostly trying to define Harris with mostly negative messages. Harris and her allies, meanwhile, have spent nearly $23 million, mostly on more positive ads introducing her to voters, according to an NPR analysis of data from the tracking firm Ad Impact. People watching TV in Georgia are already seeing a ton of campaign ads.
Today, the Harris campaign launched its first “contrast” ad, hitting Trump and linking him to the unpopular conservative road map known as Project 2025. The ad will run heavily in Georgia and other key swing states.
Harris’ campaign has invested in 24 offices in Georgia, including in traditionally Republican areas. Since Harris began running for president, White says they’ve recruited 35,000 new volunteers.
As for the weather: Trump held a rally in Georgia earlier this month, but he spent part of his speech criticizing the state’s Republican governor. (Trump has since publicly said they’ve patched things up.) This week’s bus tour is Harris’ second trip to the state in less than a month.
Polls show the race remains tight – and that’s much closer to Harris at the top of the ticket that When Biden was the presumptive nomineeBiden won by less than 12,000 votes. But the state’s two Democratic senators are proof that a Democrat can win if he runs a near-perfect campaign.
The Trump campaign will also ramp up pressure in the state this week in an attempt to win it back. Georgia Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene plans to attend a volunteer phone-in in Rome, Georgia. In a statement, she cited “dozens of paid staff, thousands of volunteers and field offices in every region of the state, from Atlanta to Savannah to Valdosta. The Trump team will not let anything slide this fall.”
For Trump, Georgia is a must-win state. For Harris, it would pave the way for the 270 electoral votes needed to win.
Harris and Walz will stop in Georgia for an interview
As Harris and Walz meet with voters in person, they are also set to sit down for their first television interview together. CNN’s Dana Bash will interview them, and the show will air Thursday night.
Throughout her fledgling campaign, Harris has been able to control her message, largely delivering prepared remarks via teleprompter. The interview is, of course, taking place in a different format, where she will likely be asked about areas where her position has shifted since the 2020 Democratic primary, when she supported a version of Medicare for All, opposed fracking and didn’t have as hard a line on immigration and border security as she does now.
She won’t be alone. Walz will also be participating in the interview, which means there will likely be questions about their relationship and how they would work together — questions that, by their nature, aren’t as perilous as trying to explain policy changes.
The Trump campaign has been publicly pestering Harris to give an interview, in part because she is looking for an issue she can really draw attention to. She has been trying unsuccessfully for five weeks to end her campaign honeymoon and get some attacks across, and this interview is the best opportunity she has had in a while.
Trump’s running mate J.D. Vance is already criticizing Harris and Walz for making a joint appearance instead of letting Harris sit alone for questioning. But it’s unclear how much voters really care about such niceties.
