MADISON – Former Vice President Kamala Harris talked about voting, Iran and responded to Gaza protesters in her first stop back in Wisconsin since her 2024 election loss.
The former vice president appeared in Madison on March 1 as part of a tour promoting her book “107 Days,” a reference to her whirlwind campaign after President Joe Biden dropped out of the race in the face of pressure and scrutiny regarding his age and mental faculties.
The visit to Madison’s Orpheum Theater was one of 18 appearances Harris will make across the U.S. this spring, following her 17-stop fall 2025 tour. In the past week, she made stops in Indiana, Ohio and Michigan as well.
The conversation, moderated by podcaster and TikTok journalist V Spehar, covered topics ranging from her campaign to President Donald Trump’s actions in Iran this weekend.
Here are takeaways from Harris’ stop in Madison:
Iran: OK to have mixed feelings
Harris’ Madison stop came a day after Trump launched attacks in the Middle East, targeting Iran.
When asked about the overnight strikes that killed Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Harris said that it was OK to have mixed feelings.
“We have to be clear-eyed. You have to speak up and speak out, we have to feel the emotions we rightly feel as an extension of the fact that we care and we have empathy and we are not stupid,” she said. “We can understand and deconstruct what’s going on.”
But then she took aim at Trump and his decisions.
“This is the most incompetent presidency we’ve ever seen,” she said.
Midterms: ‘We will win’
Harris addressed the impending midterms in which Democrats are hoping to retake the House.
She said that if Democrats are able to take enough seats, it will help to start the restoration of checks and balances in the federal government. She encouraged attendees to get involved with campaigns.
“They’re scared about these midterms,” she said of Republicans. “They are scared, and we will win, but let’s not take for granted that that’s going to happen.”
She highlighted mid-decade redistricting that has taken place in some states, voting restrictions that Congress has floated and the upcoming decision in the Supreme Court case regarding the Voting Rights Act.
“I do believe we will win,” she said. “But it ain’t going to be easy.”
Voting rights and lowering the voting age
Harris spoke about the SAVE Act, which would require Americans to provide a passport or birth certificate to register to vote.
The bill has raised concerns that married women who have changed their names may be prevented from voting because the last name on their birth certificate won’t match their ID.
“Think about that,” she said. “All of us have had to try to find our birth certificate or re-create it or get a passport, which builds in what are already disincentives to register to vote. These are the games they’re playing.”
Harris said that she believes that the voting age in the U.S. should be lowered to 16, from 18, because the decisions being made now are impacting Gen Z and how they will live their lives.
“They are a larger population than the Boomers. They have only known the climate crisis. They lost significant phases in critical phases of their education and socialization because of the pandemic,” she said. “This generation of people has everything at stake in terms of what we do now and the seeds we plant over the next 50 years.”
Protester removed over Gaza chants
At one point, as Harris talked about living in Madison as a young child, a heckler challenged her to address the Biden administration’s actions toward the war in Gaza and support for Israel.
“Admit you funded a genocide,” a man shouted, as security ran to remove him. He continued to shout while employees removed him from the theater.
Harris wrote about the conflict in her book and what she wished the administration would have done differently.
“Frankly, our administration should have done more,” she said. “We have levers we could have used that were not used. I feel strongly that we have to be candid and honest about that.”
Is Wisconsin mentioned in her book?
Harris mentions Wisconsin many times in her book, including the first campaign stop she made in Milwaukee, her event alongside Tim Walz at Firserv Forum during the Democratic National Convention, and her appearance at Ripon College, alongside Republican Liz Cheney.
She said that her campaign always knew the “path to the White House ran through Wisconsin,” and she appeared frequently in the state during her short campaign that effectively kicked off in late July of 2024.
Harris lived in Madison for a short time while she was young and, she said in the book, the “beauty of the state” brought back fond childhood memories.
Trump defeated Harris by less than 1 percentage point in Wisconsin in 2024, a result that officially put the Republican former president over the top in the Electoral College to reclaim the office.
Laura Schulte can be reached at leschulte@jrn.com and on X @SchulteLaura.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Takeaways from Kamala Harris’ book tour stop in Madison
Reporting by Laura Schulte, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
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