CHICAGO — Night two of the Democratic National Convention (DNC) is underway and the tone has flipped from the past to the present. The Democrats are getting down to the business at hand, and their focus is now fully on Vice President Kamala Harris and her campaign for president.
The second night’s theme is a “Bold Vision For America’s future.”
American University Professor and Political Analyst Lenny Steinhorn says to think of the slogan as the campaign’s bumper sticker. It’s a message or a theme to help focus the Democratic Party as they move forward.
"What the Harris campaign is trying to do is contrast their vision of the future with Donald Trump and the past, and they're going to be able to argue with that sense of what the future is all about, that Donald Trump is stuck in the past, that he's divisive, that he's looking backward, that he's of the old generation,” says Steinhorn.
Steinhorn says it’s all about contrast and messaging.
“Kamala Harris and Tim Walz, and the Democratic Party represent the future, the young, the energetic, the entrepreneurial, the people who want to be able to take on the challenges of today and tomorrow,” he says.
Something else that stands out about this years convention is the unprecedented number of Republicans taking the stage, including Stephanie Grisham, Donald Trump’s former Press Secretary.
“It's always a gift to any political party when somebody from the other party or somebody who had supported the other nominee says, 'nope, this is the wrong person.' I know them. I see the damage they can do. I'm going to go with your party,” says Steinhorn.
It's an appeal to the voters who are still unsure of who they will vote for this November.
“In this particular case, you have people like his former press secretary, Stephanie Grisham, other Republican officials, basically saying, we know Donald Trump, and we do not want him to have the levers of power and sit in the Oval Office anymore," Steinhorn adds.
You may have also noticed that the speeches are much shorter on night two of the DNC.
“They (speeches) did run long last night. Very unfortunate that Joe Biden was on very late on the East Coast. He missed prime time. What they're doing is starting earlier, and really clamping down on the speeches, telling people that they have to shorten their speeches. Make them punchier,” says Steinhorn.
Polling from CBS News shows the amount of voters considered “flippable” this election is only 7%. These voters tend to be younger, and more racially diverse. They tend to identify as politically independent, and they tend to use social media platforms like Instagram and TikTok for news.
Steinhorn says the undecided, or "flippable" voters, are the ones to watch.
“These are the critical votes in states like Pennsylvania and Michigan and Wisconsin and Arizona and Georgia and North Carolina. These are critical votes. Why? Because, when you look back, for example, to 2016 when Hillary Clinton lost to Donald Trump in the Electoral College, if about 80,000 votes switched from Donald Trump in three states to Hillary Clinton, she would have been President Clinton.”