HISPANDERING: Kamala Harris’s Univision Town Hall

Jorge Bonilla
October 11th, 2024 2:12 AM

Text to Speech

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Vice President Kamala Harris’s Univision town hall went about as expected. Nothing earth-shattering but with some interesting choices from Univision, and with more unanswered questions than at the beginning. The Regime Media’s coverage of the town hall will include some version of “Harris addressed Latino voters in Las Vegas.” Technically, she did both of these things. But of the nine questioners at this town hall, only ONE was from Las Vegas.

The rest came from such locations as Tampa (FL), San Diego (CA), Deltona (FL), Santa Monica (CA), Yuma (AZ), Beloit (WI) and two persons from Los Angeles. This leaves one wondering whether it is a common practice to fly town hall participants from across the country. Enrique Acevedo moderated this town hall in the truest sense, asking no questions of his own and letting the attendees’ questions set the tone.

Harris begins with an opening statement that triples down on her attempt to inject herself into Florida’s response to Hurricane Milton before rolling into her stump speech:

The first question is from a gentleman from Tampa, with concerns that the administration’s response to Helene was insufficient. Harris goes into other elements of her stump speech:

Next, the only attendee local to Las Vegas, who asks what amounts to an immigration question -- personal story notwithstanding. Harris goes into standard immigration talking points:

The next question comes from a Department of Defense employee from San Diego who had to wait two years for an MRI. This becomes a question about how to improve “access to health care,” which Harris calls a right.

The next questioner, from Deltona, Florida: “How will you help the disabled people so that they can get insurance and Make America Great Again?”

The next questioner, from Santa Monica, CA, asks Harris to explain how she became the Democrat nominee. Harris repeats multiple hoaxes:

Probably the most interesting question of the night, from Carlos from Yuma, who asks Harris to differentiate herself from Biden on immigration.

Back to immigration: Harris gets asked how she will preserve DACA. Harris pitches a comprehensive immigration bill. The questioner is from Pico Rivera, CA:

Harris gets a food prices questions from a voter in Chino Hills, CA. Harris responds with word salads on price gouging, etc.

Next, the obligatory abortion question, from a voter from Beloit, WI:

Finally, a chief of staff from UCLA asks Harris to name three virtues possessed by former President Donald Trump. Harris can only name one.

Post-town hall, there is some question over whether Harris used a teleprompter during the town hall. I suspect that the teleprompter going viral is there for the moderator. Had Harris’s prompter shut down, she would’ve glitched out á la “32 days.”

Moderator Acevedo did a reasonably good job of keeping the questions moving. There remains the question regarding why questioners were flown in from around the country. President Donald Trump’s town hall is next week. We’ll see whether anything changes in the moderation, format, or questions asked by the audience. As far as this town hall went, I suspect it didn’t move the needle with where Hispanics are at on Harris. But it did expose her on immigration and continuity with Joe Biden. Back to the drawing board.

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