It was a tale of two crowds, separated by a long fence.
Delegates, politicians and protesters converged on Chicago as the 2024 Democratic National Convention began on Monday. On the streets outside the United Center, where the convention is holding its evening events, demonstrators marched and chanted against the Biden-Harris administration’s support of Israel, as well as for LGBTQ+ and immigrants’ rights.
Behind long metal barriers and Secret Service checkpoints, the mood was more celebratory. Conventiongoers reported a sense of joy and excitement as the party put on a show of unity behind their presidential ticket, Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.
“I am seeing excitement that I haven’t seen since 2008,” said Michigan Democratic Party Vice Chair Jason Morgan, a DNC superdelegate. “There’s just universal excitement about VP Harris and Governor Walz.”
News outlets and political commentators have drawn comparisons between this DNC and the contentious DNC in 1968. Both were held in Chicago, both occurred after the incumbent president decided not to seek his party’s nomination (Lyndon B. Johnson and Joe Biden), and both saw protests about U.S. involvement in foreign wars (Vietnam and the Middle East).
The 2024 delegates — who can ride shuttles between their hotels and the convention centers on roads separated from the public — did not seem to be concerned about the protests.
“People back in Texas have been sending me notes about ‘be careful’ and ‘do this’ or ‘do that.’ I have not had one moment where I’ve had any feeling that I should be careful,” Carol Teitelman, a delegate from Texas, told The Daily.
She said she has friends who lived through the experience of 1968.
“They remember tanks rolling down the streets of Evanston,” Teitelman said. “I have not had anything like that.”
The police riots and tear gas that characterized the 1968 convention were not repeated on Monday. Instead, the demonstrators marched past police barricades which kept them far from the convention center.
The protesters yelled chants and waved signs to try to push the Biden administration — and a potential Harris administration — to stop supporting Israel. Israel’s war in Gaza has killed over 40,000 people, according to Palestinian officials, since the militant group Hamas killed about 1,200 Israelis on Oct. 7, 2023, according to Israeli officials.
“I would like to see you and be proud of you as the first woman president,” Elsa Rassbach, 81, told The Daily when asked for her message for Harris. “I get tears in my eyes as I say this because I’ve been waiting for a woman president for so long. Could you please change your policy so that I can vote for you?”
While the marchers had relatively peaceful interactions with the police compared to 1968, demonstrators criticized the heavy law enforcement.
One protester, a self-described anarchist named April who asked to be identified by her first name, said the presence of a helicopter above the march made her feel “surveilled” and “threatened.”
Another demonstrator, Nicholas Pizza from Hackensack, New Jersey, explained their rationale for protesting.
“This is one of the last means that we have of expressing our voices as political subjects,” Pizza said. “The fact that that’s being suppressed more and more by the police, to me, is just a sign of our waning into a further kind of fascism.”
Meanwhile in the United Center, Democratic speakers were focused on criticism from their right, not their left. A slate of speakers on primetime TV attempted to introduce Harris and Walz to the American public as they attacked former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee.
Among other messages, speakers and prepared videos played up the Biden-Harris administration’s handling of COVID, emphasized Democratic support for unions and the middle class, pledged to protect reproductive rights, and reminded the public that Trump was convicted of 34 felony counts in New York for records of payments to cover up an affair with a porn star before the 2016 election.
During former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s speech, the crowd of delegates chanted “Lock him up” — echoing a chant that had been directed toward Clinton when she was the Democratic nominee against Trump in 2016.
Speakers also emphasized Harris’ identity as a Black and Asian woman. If she is elected, she would be the first woman and first Asian-American elected to the presidency.
“We can’t lose sight of how amazing it is that, once again, the Democrats have put up a woman to be their nominee,” CNN presidential historian Douglas Brinkley said earlier in the day. “If she gets elected, it’s a seismic moment in history, and people will say ‘I was at the convention when the first woman became president.’”
The final speaker of the night was Biden, who won the Democratic primary election but dropped out of the race in July after a poor debate performance, which added fire to questions about whether he was too old to run again.
In the buildup to his speech, Democrats praised Biden and gave him his laurels. Senator Chris Coons, from Biden’s home state of Delaware, led the crowd in chants of “We love Joe!” The DNC passed out signs with those words on them — with a heart in place of “Love.” When Biden took the stage, the crowd raised the signs in unison.
Throughout the night, the attention had been entirely focused on the stage and its speakers.
Until Biden’s speech.
Near the beginning of the president’s speech, the energy in the room shifted, as the crowd turned to watch some commotion at the far end of the arena by the Florida delegation sign.
A flag — red and green, like the flags outside in the protests — was being raised. A TV camera panned to show it. It had already been covered up by a wall of “We Love Joe” signs.
Later in the speech, Biden addressed the activity outside. “Those protesters out in the street, they have a point. A lot of innocent people are being killed on both sides.”
The comment did not pack much substance on policy, but it was a rhetorical olive branch — and an acknowledgment that, at the very least, some of the message had gotten past the gates.
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