On Monday night, President Joe Biden finally built the bridge.
“I view myself as a bridge, not as anything else,” Biden, then still a septuagenarian, said in March 2020, onstage with Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and then-Sen. Kamala Harris. “There’s an entire generation of leaders you saw [standing] behind me. They are the future of this country.”
For 3½ years, there was little sign Biden intended to follow through. Harris, selected as his vice president, seemed to be flailing. As Biden struggled through his 2024 reelection bid, other promising Democrats were stuck in place. But after he was forced out of the race in July following a shockingly poor debate performance, the first night of the Democratic National Convention featured the party’s old guard handing over the keys to the party to a new generation.
Of the 25 elected officials who were scheduled to speak, 13 were under 50 years old. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, 34, brought the house down and seemingly leveled her career up with her speech. Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, 37, slammed ― literally ― the conservative blueprint called Project 2025 after bringing it out as a large printed book. Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, 48, and a trio of young women delivered the party’s most important message, promising to protect abortion rights.
Other young leaders, including Whitmer, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, were seemingly held in reserve, with the speaking schedule for the next three nights not yet fully revealed.
The youth push also helps the party sell the idea of Harris as a fresh start , a way to move past the chaotic politics of eras defined by former President Donald Trump and the coronavirus pandemic.
Meanwhile, the party gave time to the leaders of its past. An early segment honored the Rev. Jesse Jackson, now stricken with Parkinson’s, whose presidential runs in the 1980s helped create the modern progressive movement. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton placed Harris in a tradition of groundbreaking female candidates. And, of course, Biden himself passed the direct responsibility of defeating Trump and defending democracy to Harris.
“There’s a transition taking place,” said Rep. James Clyburn (S.C.), one of a trio of House Democratic leaders who held on to power into their eighth decades before stepping down after the 2022 elections. “You know, it’s kind of interesting. Joe Biden said from day one that he wanted to be that kind of president. Whether he planned the timing of it or not, he’s certainly done that.”
President Joe Biden holds hands Monday night with Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, after he delivering the keynote address on the first day of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
In his speech, Biden mostly took a hammer to Trump, unleashing a familiar litany of attack lines against the Republican’s character and policies while hyping his own successes in office. Toward the end of his speech, however, he reflected on his decision to step aside from his reelection bid.
“ It’s been an honor of a lifetime to serve as your president. I love the job. But I love my country more,” Biden said, adding: “All this talk about how I’m angry at all those people who said I should step down, that’s not true.”
“We need you to beat Donald Trump and elect Kamala and Tim,” he implored the crowd.
Biden was greeted on stage by a four-minute standing ovation, the longest of the night. Well before he spoke, the crowd occasionally burst into “We love Joe” chants, with essentially every speaker dedicating time to praise the outgoing 81-year-old’s accomplishments as president.
There was some awkwardness, such as when news cameras lingered on former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi ― who played a major role in Biden’s departure from the 2024 campaign ― as she chanted “We love Joe.” Republicans also tried to elevate the delayed start of Biden’s speech into an example of disrespect. (Convention officials said the hour-late start, at about 10:30 p.m. Central time, was due to “raucous applause” interrupting earlier speeches.)
Biden was not the only member of the Democratic Party’s old guard to pass a baton to Harris. Clinton, who lost to Trump in 2016, said Harris could finally achieve for American women what she came just tens of thousands of votes short of doing eight years ago.
“Together we’ve put a lot of cracks in the highest, hardest glass ceiling,” Clinton said. “Tonight we are so close to breaking through once and for all. I want to tell you what I see through all those cracks. And what it matters for each and every one of us.”
The figurative cracks in the glass ceiling came in the form of a host of younger female Democrats whom the party chose to elevate before and after Clinton’s remarks to the packed arena.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a fellow New Yorker who once volunteered for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Clinton’s left-wing primary rival in 2016, had the speaking spot before Clinton.
On the verge of her fourth term in Congress, Ocasio-Cortez seized the opportunity to introduce herself anew to a national audience with remarks highlighting her roots as a bartender and the Democratic Party’s advocacy for ordinary people.
“You know, ever since I got elected, Republicans have attacked me by saying that I should go back to bartending,” she said. “I’d be happy to ― any day of the week ― because there is nothing wrong with working for a living. Imagine having leaders in the White House who understand that — leaders like Kamala and Tim.”
Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Texas, a 43-year-old former public defender, characterized Harris as a criminal justice reformer whom young progressives can get behind.
“She was the first attorney general in the nation to order her officers to wear bodycams, and she started the Back on Track program to reduce recidivism,” Crockett said. “She did all those things because she genuinely cares about people.”
Crockett also showed off her penchant for alliteration ― a skill first made famous while she was firing back at Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) during a May hearing.
“The question before us is, will a vindictive, vile villain violate voters’ vision for a better America, or not?” she asked, before adding an unscripted comment, “I hear alliterations are back in style.”
And finally, Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, the swing state’s 37-year-old Senate majority whip, used her time on the stage to not only slam Project 2025 but also to read from it. The policy proposal, which key Trump aides played major roles in crafting, has become a focal point of Democratic messaging despite the Republican’s attempts to distance himself from it.
“They went ahead and wrote down all the extreme things Donald Trump wants to do over the next four years. And then they just tweeted it out,” said McMorrow, who is expected to run for statewide office in 2026.
“We believe in the separation of powers and the rule of law. We believe in a system built up to serve everyone, not breaking a system to serve one petty, selfish man,” she concluded.
Another segment of the convention featured rising stars at the state level, including 34-year-old Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. Austin Davis, 49-year-old Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Sara Rodriguez and 33-year-old Harris County, Texas, Judge Lina Hidalgo.
Biden himself ended the night by reminiscing about his youth. “I was too young to be in the Senate,” said Biden, who was elected before his 30th birthday and then sworn in afterward. “And I was too old to stay on as president.” The line appeared to be ad-libbed.
The last lines of his speech were not. “I’m more optimistic about the future than I was when I was elected as a 29-year-old United States senator. I mean it! We just have to remember who we are. We are the United States of America, and there’s nothing we can not do when we do it together.”
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