What They’re Saying: Kamala Harris Delivered “Best” Speech at Liberty and Justice Dinner
The reviews are in: Senator Kamala Harris commanded the stage and delivered the best speech at the Iowa Democratic Party’s Liberty and Justice event last night. Harris received the largest cheers as Harris pointed to her career’s record of confronting injustice, and argued that she is best qualified to take on a lawless president in Donald Trump directly and win on behalf of the people.
Read some of what reporters, pundits, and Iowans are all agreeing on: Kamala delivered.
Ben Rhodes MSNBC analyst: "We've got an election coming up where the stakes are higher than anything I can remember my whole life. And I'd like to see them really go big. And @KamalaHarris did tonight. She came out like a fighter. She came out like, I get it, I get how upset people are."
Michael Cohen, Boston Globe: Kamala Harris giving what might be the best speech of the night
Jennifer Rubin, Washington Post: Best speech of the campaign. Back to the wall. Impressive level of seriousness and determination
Chris Cadelago, Politico: The thing people always say about Kamala over her career—from family members to close aides—is she’s a clutch player. A long way to go to get back up in
Iowa, but probably the best speech she could have given at a make-or-break time
Cadelago: This is Kamala's best speech and the clearest rationale for her campaign since Oakland.
Kendis Gibson, MSNBC: Senator @KamalaHarris so far has the loudest crowd of the night in Iowa. #LJ19
Dave Weigel, Washington Post: Harris is delivering the best speech I've heard from her at these all-candidate events, a rat-a-tat of applause lines with the tight delivery we saw at the first debate.
Bill Ruthhart, Chicago Tribune: Kamala Harris has taken the stage, buoyed by a crowd of supporters only rivaled by Warren and Buttigieg: "Iowa, I stand before you here today, for the people, fully prepared to beat Donald Trump." "For the people!" Harris supporters chant.
Jennifer Palmieri, former Hillary Clinton and Obama Communications Director: .@KamalaHarris delivers with great speech. Only candidate I saw to get standing ovation from people other than her supporters. Also, love from the #khive is heartwarming to behold. They love their candidate! #LJ19
Joshua Jamerson, Wall Street Journal: I believe Kamala Harris is the first candidate at #LJ19 to bring up protecting women's reproductive rights from attack from GOP legislatures
Melanie Mason, LA Times: .@KamalaHarris, after a bad week, delivered one of her sharpest performances in a long while. The best articulation of the reason for her candidacy since her launch event in January
Reid Wilson, The Hill: Entirely unscientific and (paid) crowd-aided rankings of biggest applause at tonight's Iowa Dem dinner:
Harris
Buttigieg
Warren
Booker
Biden
Klobuchar
Sanders
Yang
Castro
Bullock
Steyer
Bennet
Delaney
Charlotte Clymer, HRC Communications Director: If I'm Kamala Harris' comms staff, I'm putting those "America is on the ballot" lines in every single speech moving forward. Really well done.
#LJ19
Clymer: Seriously, Kamala Harris is bringing it. Her campaign needs to clip and share this speech everywhere. It's a hell of a message.
Clymer: Kamala Harris is on fire tonight. This is a great speech.
#LJ19
Brian Fallon, Executive Director of We Demand Justice: That Kamala Harris speech was crisp, and full of fight.
Charles Pierce, Esquire: Kamala Harris just gave a terrific speech.
Bakari Sellers, former SC state senator: This is the best I’ve heard Kamala. Period.
Robert Wolf: #LJ19 @KamalaHarris brings down the house with this line 👏
“To win, we're gonna need a nominee on that stage with Donald Trump who has the ability to go toe-to-toe with him. And Iowa, you're looking at HER."
Zach Wahls, Iowa State Senator: Sen. Harris tonight delivering the best speech I've heard her give. Gives a shout out to Beto for his courage in taking on the gun lobby.
Alyssa Mastromonaco, former White House Deputy Chief of Staff: tonight in Des Moines @KamalaHarris just brought down the and doing a gave a proper shout out to @BetoORourke #LJ19 #forthepeople 🔥
Franklin Leonard, @theblcklst founder: I think we can all agree who has the most Presidential entrance walk.
Joanna Peña-Bickley, activist: #KamalaCrushedIt! That was a unifying call to place #JusticeIsOnTheBallot. @KamalaHarris art fully made the case to move us from party purity, dogmatic labels & ideology to systematically unlocking our potential as a united state of humans.
