Obama tells Democrats at Milwaukee rally that ‘values matter,’ urges voting

With just days until the presidential election, Barack Obama rallied voters for Kamala Harris at the Baird Center in Milwaukee.

Speaking to over 5,000 people midday Sunday — “We have to wrap up before the Packers-Lions game starts,” the former president explained — Obama sought to connect with Democratic voters in the state’s largest city and one of its Democratic strongholds.

The event, which also featured a speech by Democratic U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin, who is seeking reelection, comes on the heels of dueling campaign appearances on Friday by Democratic Vice President Harris and Republican former President Donald Trump. The Friday rallies were the second time in the campaign’s final week that both candidates appeared in Wisconsin on the same night.

Obama took some shots at Donald Trump, including the Republican presidential candidate’s “constant attempts to sell you stuff,” like branded sneakers and Bibles.

He praised Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris’ political positions, including a plan to build 3 million houses, her support for 2024’s bipartisan border bill and her promise to sign a law legalizing abortion nationwide.

He also countered hypothetical arguments Republicans might have, like that the U.S. economy was stronger under Trump.

“It was, because it was my economy,” Obama said to raucous cheers. Obama was president from 2009 to 2017.

But the room became somber as he reflected on the “toughest to answer” question from undecided voters: that politicians are “all the same” and make “empty promises.”

“If you live in a neighborhood in Milwaukee where gun violence and the drug trade are a fact of life, parents are scared about their kids just getting to and from school, you’re going to feel the same way,” Obama said.

“I want to be honest,” he admitted. “You’re right: politics is not going to solve all of your problems.”

“What government can do is make your life a little better,” Obama said, recalling an encounter with campaign volunteers in Maryland who told him the Affordable Care Act had protected their families from illness.

He then said that presidents “make a million decisions, and most of the time they’re judgment calls.”

“It’s really important — does that person have a moral compass, do they have some integrity, are they focused on doing what’s right by the American people?” Obama asked rhetorically. “Values matter.”

Obama argued that Harris “has conducted herself with grace and with dignity” throughout her career, does not “demonize those who do not support her,” and “will care and listen to all the people of these United States.”

Republicans on Sunday evening were set to hold a “Team Trump on Tour” rally featuring former Democratic U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii and former NASCAR driver Danica Patrick.

In a statement on Democrats’ weekend events, the Trump campaign said Trump “has built the largest coalition of supporters, including Tulsi Gabbard, RFK Jr, Brett Favre, Elon Musk, and many others. Kamala Harris’ desperate attempt to distract voters from her disastrous record won’t work.”

Voter turnout in Milwaukee could decide election

Turning out the vote in Milwaukee is crucial for Democrats hoping to keep the state blue.

When Obama ran for reelection in 2012, he won almost 170,000 more votes in Milwaukee County than Republican candidate Mitt Romney. That difference powered his victory, making up over 80 percent of his total winning margin statewide.

Since then, voter turnout in Milwaukee has sagged, especially among Black voters.

According to a 2022 analysis by Marquette University researcher John Johnson, voter turnout declined by as much as 30 percentage points in many parts of the city’s majority-Black north side even as it held steady in other neighborhoods. His analysis says 2012 was a peak year for overall turnout in Milwaukee.

That drop is palpable statewide. Census data says that in 2020, even amid record turnout across the country, Black voter turnout in Wisconsin fell to 43.5 percent. It had been over 73 percent eight years before.

Almost 60 percent of Wisconsin’s Black population lives in the city of Milwaukee.

Democrats will almost certainly win Milwaukee and its county again in 2024. In fact, a poor performance by Trump in 2020 allowed Joe Biden to increase his margin in Milwaukee County even while netting fewer votes than Obama. But with Wisconsin’s razor-thin margins in recent elections, the exact size of their victory in Wisconsin’s most populous county could be a decider.

The Harris campaign appears to be throwing everything it can at the city, with several Milwaukee-area rallies — some including performances by Black musicians including GloRilla and The Isley Brothers. Obama is not the first campaign surrogate to visit the city, and there are grassroots efforts to turn out the vote, too.

The fruits of their labor remain to be seen. But early voting statistics released by the Wisconsin Elections Commission Sunday may be bad news for Democrats: only 155,726 ballots have been cast early in the city of Milwaukee.

The number includes in-person and mail-in early ballots, but accounts for only 27 percent of the city’s population. Statewide, 40.8 percent of Wisconsin’s population has already voted.