The DNC gave me hope for our national ticket, and for down ballot races here in Kentucky | Opinion

There is the convention I expected to take place, and then there is the convention that actually did.

They are not the same.

Kentucky Democrats elected me in June to represent them as one of several dozen delegates to the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. I had never participated in a convention before, so I grabbed insights from wherever I could to fill in a picture of what I was about to experience.

At that time, the insights I gleaned were not great.

Democrats across the state and country confided in me trepidation about President Joe Biden’s chances in November, and his age. Surveys revealed a persistent disconnect in how economists and families each measured the strength of the American economy. Internal Democratic divisions on President Biden’s approach to the Israeli invasion of Gaza gave pundits easy opportunities to link the violence of the 1968 Chicago convention to predicted disturbances this year. And while arguments against the anti-democratic Project 2025 GOP playbook to systematically strip away rights from women, parents, and workers reverberated with voters, would it be enough?

Then came one more data point: the debate.

We all lived it, and the three weeks that followed it. The popular tension and discontent that has bubbled under the surface of American society since the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic reached another boiling point.

President Biden’s selfless and patriotic decision on July 21 to get out of the race, and endorse his Vice President relieved America of the tension we had all felt. In the four short weeks since that decision, the candidacy of Kamala Harris has given Americans something almost foreign: hope and joy.

I needed to grab some new data points.

The Fayette County Democratic Party (of which I am a member) got four times as many new volunteers in three days as we typically get in one year. Sustaining donations and one-time donations to our finance pages jumped — 69% being first-time donors. Candidate events during the Veepstakes, where our own hope and joy Governor Andy Beshear elevated his and our national profiles, suddenly became the hottest ticket in town. Kentucky’s own Ashley Judd held a zoom call “Women for Kentucky” that raised over $18,000 for the House Democratic Caucus.

The Democratic Convention took place this week, and while there was a natural focus on the need to elect Kamala Harris as President, all throughout the convention hall and the shuttle buses were deeper conversations about harnessing the genuine energy of the grassroots. The lights shown on Kamala Harris and her would-be Vice President Tim Walz illuminated the down ballot races on which so many of us are focused.

If the sense before was that Democrats needed to re-elect Biden to stop the prospect of unified Republican federal control, the convention we experienced this week is actively stressing the importance of and methods to increase our organizational capacity to bring tonal and generational change to our politics.

While speeches and rallies lead with our shared values on reproductive access, teachers, gun safety, and the resurgence of American manufacturing, the real message of nearly all official and unofficial gatherings has been clear: let’s get to work.

Congressman Maxwell Frost (D-FL), the first Gen Z member of Congress, spoke to the Kentucky delegation about the power of organizing. He noted that in a world where voters and non-voters are inundated with negative media, a knock on the door from a well-meaning neighbor organizing for change can create new narratives. Louisville’s Representative Morgan McGarvey (D-KY) charged our delegates with the responsibility to mobilize themselves and others to flip one-by-one Kentucky House and Senate seats. Governor Laura Kelly (D-KS) challenged Kentucky Democrats to think of a time when Andy Beshear will no longer be in office, and to plan, prepare, and build our bench.

In November 2024, all 100 seats of the Kentucky House of Representatives are up for election, as well as half of the Kentucky Senate. Republicans have successfully redistricted themselves into reliable red-seats for the time being, but some metrics have given Kentucky Democrats optimism. Governor Beshear performed strongly in most of those red districts, and delegates here getting fired up and trained on how to translate new enthusiasm for the top of our ticket into the data points that candidates care about: doors knocked, campaign literature dropped, donations received, and mailers sent.

Candidates like Adam Moore in Lexington, and Kate Farrow in Louisville, will certainly benefit. But the question will be, can local organizers turn out the vote, and reestablish Democratic presence, in all corners of the Commonwealth?

Placard rally signs in the United Center passed around to delegates quote a slogan of the Harris/Walz campaign: “When we fight, we win.”

Delegates at the Democratic National Convention are ready to put this slogan to the test — especially right here in Kentucky.

Roy Harrison, a Lexington resident, was a delegate to the 2024 Democratic National Convention.