Courting Latino voters, Kamala Harris to visit Las Vegas after Biden-Trump debate

Joey Garrison, USA TODAY
·2 min read

Vice President Kamala Harris is set to stump in Las Vegas the day after President Joe Biden's first debate with former President Donald Trump next week in a post-debate push targeting Latino voters.

Harris will discuss "the stakes of the election for Latino voters" during next Friday's campaign stop, the Biden campaign said. She will be making her fifth trip this year to Nevada, a crucial battleground state in the 2024 election, and her 13th as vice president.

Biden and Trump are taking part in their first televised debate of the election next Thursday on CNN. Biden is spending the coming days at the Camp David presidential retreat in Maryland with top White House aides preparing for the debate.

More: Can Biden count on Hispanic voters in a Trump rematch? Weakening support raises alarm for 2024.

Harris will be joined by second gentleman Doug Emhoff at the Nevada event. Ahead of the debate on Monday, Harris is set to visit Arizona, where she will target Hispanic voters on the two-year anniversary of the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization Supreme Court decision that overturned the 50-year Roe v. Wade precedent protecting a constitutional right to an abortion.

Polling has shown Biden underperforming among Latino voters, a key Democratic constituency, compared to his 2020 victory against Trump. Exit polls found Biden won Hispanic voters by a 65%-32% margin over Trump in the 2020 election.

Vice President Kamala Harris speaks during a conversation with Quavo at the Rocket Foundation Summit on gun violence prevention at the Carter Center on June 18, 2024, in Atlanta, Georgia.
Vice President Kamala Harris speaks during a conversation with Quavo at the Rocket Foundation Summit on gun violence prevention at the Carter Center on June 18, 2024, in Atlanta, Georgia.

But in a Fox News poll released Wednesday that found Biden leading Trump 43%-42% nationally, Biden leads Trump 45%-40% among Hispanic voters, followed by independent Robert F. Kennedy Jr., 11%. Biden leads Trump 50%-48 in a head-to-head race with no third-party candidates, and Hispanic voters 53%-43%, the poll found.

More: Biden ad attacks 'convicted criminal' Trump in $50M paid media blitz

Biden carried Nevada by less than 34,000 votes in the 2020 election, but Trump currently leads Biden in Nevada 5.7 percentage points, according to the Real Clear Politics average of polls.

Biden, amid criticism from Republicans over his handling of immigration, took executive action this month to prevent migrants from seeking asylum at the U.S-Mexico. border when border crossings surge, like presently. On Tuesday, Biden unveiled a program that seeks to protect people who are in the country illegally but are married to U.S. citizens from being deported.

Reach Joey Garrison on X @joeygarrison.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Kamala Harris to visit Nevada in attempt to woo Latino voters