THE DEMOCRATS ARE almost giddy right now. No, scrap that, they’re actually giddy.
“Is this us? Is this really us? I almost don’t recognise us,” one attendee told The Journal in the hallway of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago late last night.
Speakers have slagged off Republican politicians from the stage. When Hillary Clinton spoke, the crowd chanted “LOCK HIM UP” about Donald Trump. Usually stiff politicians look – gasp! – like they’re actually having fun.
You could say they’re taking things that the Republicans do all the time and Democrat-ifying them.
And last night, the Democrats came for that last stronghold of the Republican party: family values.
In a double-header of speeches, Michelle and Barack Obama spoke about the values of the women who raised them (“Honesty and integrity. Kindness and hard work”), using their personal stories to draw parallels with Kamala Harris and her family. But they also used them to call out Donald Trump and his values.
The two directly and strongly criticised Trump by name, something Democratic politicians shied away from in the past, in yet another break from the party’s normal way of doing business.
Barack Obama spoke about – actually, let’s come back to that. Because the big speech of the night, and of the convention so far, was Michelle Obama’s.
The former first lady spoke initially about the momentum that the party has seen in recent weeks. “Hope is making a comeback,” she told the crowd.
But she then spoke movingly about the death of her mother at the end of May, and how she hadn’t even been sure “if I’d be steady enough to stand before you tonight”.
Her mother, Marian Robinson, “was glad to do the thankless, unglamorous work that for generations has strengthened the fabric of this nation,” Michelle Obama said. “That if you do unto others, if you love thy neighbour, if you work and scrape and sacrifice, it will pay off, if not for you then maybe for your children or your grandchildren.”
“These were the values my mother poured into me until her very last breath.”
She drew a parallel between her mother and Kamala Harris’s mother. “She’d often tell her daughter, don’t sit around and complain about things, do something.”
And then she invoked Trump. It was subtle – at first.
To huge applause, she described how the majority of Americans “will never benefit from the affirmative action of generational wealth”.
“If we bankrupt a business… we don’t get a second, third or fourth chance if things don’t go our way. We don’t have the luxury of whining or cheating others to get further ahead.”
And then she got more direct.
“For years, Donald Trump did everything in his power to try to make people fear [Barack and I]. His limited, narrow view of the world made him feel threatened by the existence of two hard-working, highly-educated, successful people who happen to be black.”
She took aim at a recent comment by Donald Trump who had told an audience of black journalists that migrants were coming to take “black jobs”.
“Who’s gonna tell him? Who’s gonna tell him? That the job he’s currently seeking might just be one of those black jobs.”
It was one of the most applauded lines of the night.
In her much-quoted 2016 speech imploring Democrats that “when they go low, we go high,” Michelle Obama never actually mentioned Trump by name. This speech marked a clear change of direction from someone who remains one of the most popular and influential figures in the Democratic Party, despite – or perhaps because of – the fact that she never held office.
She finished her speech with a call to action for Democrats, gently chastising party members who prefer to sit around and give out.
“Don’t complain if no one from the campaign has specifically reached out to you to ask you for your support. There is simply no time for that kind of foolishness. You know what you need to do,” she said. “Consider this your official invitation. Michelle Obama is asking.”
She received huge applause throughout the speech from the crowd.
Barack Obama walked on stage after his wife to U2’s City of Blinding Lights and said what everyone was thinking: “I’m the only person stupid enough to speak after Michelle Obama,” he told the crowd.
The former US president praised Kamala Harris, describing her as “someone who sees you and hears you and will get up every single day and fight for you.”
“Yes she can,” he said, recalling his own campaign slogan of 2008.
He too took direct aim at Donald Trump.
“Here’s a 78-year-old billionaire who has not stopped whining about his problems since he rode down his golden escalator nine years ago.”
“It has been a constant stream of gripes and grievances that’s actually going to get worse. Now that he’s afraid of losing, there’s the childish nicknames, the crazy conspiracy theories, this weird obsession with crowd sizes.”
“We do not need four more years of bluster and bumbling and chaos. We have seen that movie before, and we all know that the sequel is usually worse.”
Without mentioning Republican nominee for vice president JD Vance, Obama praised the authenticity of Democratic vice presidential nominee, Tim Walz.
“Born in a small town, served his country, taught kids, coached football, took care of his neighbours. He knows who he is, and he knows what’s important.
“You can tell those flannel shirts he wears don’t come from some political consultant. They come from his closet, and they have been through some stuff.”
Like Michelle Obama, Barack Obama too chastised his own party, calling on members not to ‘cancel’ wavering Democrat voters but instead to try to win them over.
“If we want to win over those who aren’t yet ready to support our candidates, we need to listen to their concerns and maybe learn something in the process,” he said.
“After all, if a parent or grandparent occasionally says something that makes us cringe, we don’t automatically assume they’re bad people. We recognise that the world is moving fast, that they need time to make a little effort to catch up.”
Both speeches hit on some of the recurring themes of the DNC this week.
The party has eschewed big policy discussions, such as Gaza, climate change and Ukraine, in favour of focusing on a small number of topics, including class and background, in order to draw a contrast with the Republican nominees for president, and to introduce Kamala Harris to the country.
One of the big chants from the crowd at the DNC this week has been ‘We’re not going back’. The Obamas represent the past for the Democrats – but with their speeches, they also charted a way forward for the party.
One that’s feistier, more on the offence than defence – and one that puts the fight up to the Republicans that hasn’t been seen for a long, long time.
The big question for the Democrats after this is simple: how are the Republicans going to respond?
Christine Bohan is reporting from the DNC in Chicago all this week. You can read her on the site here.
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