Connecticut Democrats rallied around Vice President Kamala Harris as the party’s likely nominee for president Sunday after President Joe Biden exited the race, bowing to growing concerns about the 81-year-old candidate’s ability to win and serve a second term in the White House.
With a mix of outright endorsements and praise falling just short of a commitment, the party’s leaders in the state said Harris’ nomination in Chicago was inevitable, given Biden’s endorsement and the desirability to open their convention with clarity, not chaos.
Some of the biggest Democratic names in Connecticut, including U.S. Sen Chris Murphy, followed Biden’s cue that his second-in-command has his “full support and endorsement” to become the new nominee.
“I will be enthusiastically supporting my friend, Vice President Harris, to be our nominee for President,” Murphy said on the social media platform X. “She has the perfect combination of experience, accomplishment, and deep love of country to lead our great nation.”
Gov. Ned Lamont praised her but stopped sort of pledging his vote as a delegate.
“I think that she’s the front runner, and I think if you went through an open convention, she’d be a lot stronger for it,” said Lamont, who was the first governor to endorse Biden but had hoped he would withdraw.
Lt. Gov. Susan Bysiewicz was effusive in praising Harris while standing with Lamont in stopping short of an endorsement.
“I will say that there is no one who is more qualified to become president of the United States than Kamala Harris. She’s had a career dedicated to public service that includes serving as the as a district attorney for a large city. She’s been the attorney general of the most populous state in the country. She served in the United States Senate, and she has served alongside the president during during the past three plus years,” Bysiewicz said.
Biden’s exit from the presidential race on Sunday afternoon capped a dramatic three weeks since his poor debate performance called into question his fitness for office. He tried to resist calls for him to drop out but lost critical support as Republicans united around Donald Trump last week at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.
The president’s statement was met with widespread support and praise for his agenda and work over the past three and a half years.
“President Biden has served our country with distinction for decades. We thank him profoundly for his service and leadership through some of the most difficult years of our lifetimes,” Connecticut Democratic Party chairwoman Nancy DiNardo said.
“We urge every Democrat to follow his lead. Our country is facing a threat like no other from the MAGA ticket,” she added. “The time is now to unite behind Vice President Harris and defeat Donald Trump. As the president said, let’s do this.”
Democrats are looking to unify the party amid the uncertainty.
Several said the prospect of snubbing a vice president who made history as the first woman and first Black and South Asian person to be elected on a national ticket would be unconscionable.
“I don’t think there’s another choice that makes political sense. I don’t think there’s another choice that makes strategic sense. I don’t think there’s another choice,” said state Sen. Gary Winfield of New Haven. “She’s vice president. If we believe the things that we’re supposed to believe, you can’t say she wasn’t ready to be president. That is her job.”
“The fact that she is the first woman, first Black woman, skipping over her with the assignment would be absolute disrespect” to an important element of the Democratic coalition, said Winfield, a member of the Black and Puerto Rican Caucus in the General Assembly. “That would be a disaster.”
Vinnie Mauro, the chair of the Democratic Party in New Haven and a delegate to the Democratic National Convention, said Biden made the right decision, and the party should follow his lead and rally around the vice president. He was blunter than Winfield about the risks of not coalescing around Harris.
“I think going into Chicago with an open competition is absolute fucking chaos,” Mauro said.
House Speaker Matt Ritter of Hartford made a similar endorsement of Harris.
“I’m happy that the president made a decision that he’s comfortable with. I’m endorsing Kamala Harris to be the next president. I don’t really know how you could have anybody else. The whole point of having a vice president is to serve in a situation like this,” he said.
But not everyone in Connecticut was ready to make an immediate endorsement or proclaim an open convention as an invitation to chaos or insult to Harris.
“I don’t think it’s a sign of disrespect that you go through the convention,” Lamont said. “My instinct is she’s the front runner, especially with Joe Biden’s endorsement.”
U.S. Rep. Jim Himes, who was one of three dozen members of Congress to publicly call for Biden to release his delegates and exit the race, said his sense was the congressional leadership was intending to be “more explicit” this week in urging the president to heed their calls.
He was not ready to endorse Harris, but he said he saw no realistic alternative.
“My head is still spinning a little bit,” Himes said. But, he added, based on the initial exchange of texts with colleagues, “I’d be pretty astonished if any of the probables — you know, the Whitmers, the various governors, what have you — were to say, ‘I’m gonna take a run at Harris.’”
“It’s almost inconceivable that somebody would challenge Vice President Harris. Presumably, if that were to happen, it would have to happen very, very quickly,” Himes said.
Others in Connecticut’s congressional delegation readily got behind Harris on Sunday, including U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney, D-2nd District; U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-3rd District; U.S. Rep. Jahana Hayes, D-5th District; and Murphy.
“During the last three and a half years, he’s had a great partner in Vice President Kamala Harris, who I strongly support to lead the Democratic Party to build on their record of success with a new agenda focused on our future,” Courtney said.
“History will remember Joe Biden for his selfless patriotism and leadership,” Hayes said in a statement. “President Biden worked to pass more impactful legislation than any other president in our lifetimes. Under his leadership, we have recovered from the pandemic, stabilized our relations abroad, and driven down unemployment to historic lows. I am grateful to President Biden for his decades of service to this country and the path he has paved to a brighter future for all.”
“There is no one better to continue Joe Biden’s legacy than Vice President Harris,” she said. “I have been a longtime supporter and know she will continue to move us forward and protect our country from Donald Trump and the Project 2025 agenda. Now, it is time to focus on the work of electing Kamala Harris as the next President and winning back the House so we can continue to deliver for the American people.”
After the assassination attempt at Trump’s rally in Pennsylvania on July 13, Republicans presented a unified front at their convention last week, including former political opponents of Trump and his own running mate, who was a vocal critic in 2016.
Democrats warned against creating more uncertainty and divisions heading into their own convention.
The Republicans left their convention in Milwaukee united behind Trump, and Democrats cannot afford to open a debate about Harris, said Mauro, the New Haven chair.
State Treasurer Erick Russell of New Haven, one of the two Black Democrats holding statewide office in Connecticut, praised Biden and endorsed Harris.
“I think it’s an example of what Biden has done his entire career, which is ultimately putting the country first,” Russell said. “Obviously, there are some questions around exactly what the process will look like, and we’re all waiting to see that. But Joe Biden and the country picked Kamala Harris to be vice president because of her qualifications and the work that she’s done throughout her career. And I think that’s also why he endorsed her.”
Harris said in a statement she will seek the Democratic nomination and work to unite the party in the remaining months of the race.
“I am honored to have the President’s endorsement and my intention is to earn and win this nomination,” Harris said. “Over the past year, I have traveled across the country, talking with Americans about the clear choice in this momentous election. And that is what I will continue to do in the days and weeks ahead.”