Harris is trying to turn the protests in Gaza into a way to energize the crowds at her rallies

WASHINGTON (AP) — Protesters could create awkward moments for presidential candidates. They interrupt, argue, and often throw a candidate off track.

But Vice President Kamala Harris is trying a new strategy late in the campaign to turn what would otherwise be awkward interactions into moments of energy used to rally her supporters and subtly push her message against her Republican opponent, Donald Trump , to direct.

At all three of the Democratic nominee’s rallies on Wednesday – in North Carolina, Pennsylvania And Wisconsin — pro-Palestinian protesters broke out with chants, banners and even a whistle to criticize Harris for the way she and President Joe Biden have handled the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.

Protesters in Gaza have done that long-time focused events of HarrisAnd Biden was the party’s candidate when he was still therehoping to use the disturbances to draw media attention to their case. They have often led to longer pauses as security officers moved protesters away or created awkward interactions.

After three months as a candidate, and as she tries to stick to her carefully honed closing message in the final week of the campaign, Harris’ latest tactic is to validate protesters’ concerns and use them as evidence in her case against the former. president.

When a protester in North Carolina shouted that Harris was “disrespecting the Palestinian community,” Harris used the moment to attack Trump.

“Here’s the thing: We know we’re actually fighting for a democracy,” Harris said in Raleigh. “Unlike Donald Trump, I don’t believe that people who disagree with you are the enemy.”

Hours later, in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Harris used a similar protest to embrace democracy.

“Look, I will repeat it: we are fighting for a democracy, we love our democracy,” she said. “It can be complicated at times, but it is the best system in the world.”

As she faced protests at the end of her evening in Wisconsin, Harris famously used a callback to what she said when then-Vice President Mike Pence tried to interrupt her during their 2020 debate.

“We all want the war in Gaza to end and the hostages to get out and I will do everything in my power to make this heard and known,” Harris said. “And everyone has the right to be heard, but right now I’m speaking.”

The moments at each stop energized the large crowds at Harris’ events, drowning out protesters and providing a way for her supporters to come together.

In Wisconsin, the reaction was so loud and persistent that a second group with a banner was not loud enough to disrupt the event.

Despite the way the protests were drowned out Wednesday, some pro-Palestinian figures who opposed Harris see her focus on democracy and her recognition that those protesting have the right to be heard as a softening of the Democratic nominee.

“It’s nice that her rhetoric has softened, but the time for that has passed,” said Dearborn City Council Member Mustapha Hammoud. “Instead of peace, we have seen an increase in violence during the war. So we cannot accept talk, we need actual results.” In September, Hammoud told the Associated Press that until recently he considered himself a Democrat.

Protests pose an occupational hazard for presidential candidates.

In 2016, Trump responded to a protest in Nevada by saying, “I’d like to punch him in the face.” Hillary Clinton was regularly protested by Black Lives Matter activists that same year, including at one event where protesters drowned her out for ten minutes, forcing Representative John Lewis, a civil rights icon, to ask the group to stop. And in 2020, after Biden won a series of state primaries on Super Tuesday, anti-dairy demonstrators protested stormed the stageforcing Jill Biden to protect her husband by pushing the activists aside.

“I’m a good Philly girl,” Jill Biden told reporters after the confrontation.

Harris, unlike Biden, has taken a more confrontational stance toward protesters since winning the Democratic nomination earlier this year.

When a group of pro-Palestinian protesters interrupted her at an event in August by chanting, “Kamala, Kamala, you can’t hide, we won’t vote for genocide,” Harris responded immediately: “If you want Donald Trump to win, then say that. Otherwise it’s me talking.”

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Associated Press writers Joey Cappelletti and Mike Householder in Lansing, Michigan, contributed to this report.