‘An air of excitement’: Fans enjoyed Kamala Harris and Michelle Obama’s Kalamazoo rally

KALAMAZOO, MI — On Saturday, Oct. 26, Kamala Harris and Michelle Obama will touch down in Kalamazoo to rally supporters in the final days before the election.

Harris and Obama plan to appear Saturday afternoon or evening. The exact time and location of the visit has not yet been announced.

“There’s an air of excitement,” Kalamazoo Vice Mayor Jeanne Hess said of the visit.

Hess, who helped invent and popularize the “Kamalazoo” moniker that ties the candidate to the city, hopes to see Harris win on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 5.

“Let’s see if we can connect it to the White House,” Hess said.

The vice mayor likes several things about Harris as a candidate, including her willingness to work with people across the aisle. Harris shared plans to have a Republican in his cabinet, Hess said.

“He certainly brought a more bipartisan view of politics to this country, which would be really refreshing,” Hess said.

Hess hopes Harris and Obama will feel the support of the Kalamazoo crowd on Saturday. Hess plans to attend on her own.

“This is a must,” Hess said of the need for Harris to win.

People have been asking for tickets to the Harris campaign event, though it’s unclear how many people will get tickets to attend.

Longtime Republican congressman Fred Upton, now retired, also supports Harris. He announced the approval Wednesday, Oct. 24, during a virtual press conference.

A lot has changed since Harris last visited Kalamazoo on July 17th.

First, she was in town to dump Joe Biden — it was four days before Biden dropped out and endorsed Harris. Her visit to Kalamazoo also came just four days after the assassination attempt on Donald Trump in Pennsylvania and after JD Vance was announced as Trump’s running mate.

“While our nation’s history has been marked by political violence, violence is never acceptable,” Harris said in Kalamazoo in her first public remarks since the shooting. “There can be no equivocation about that.”

That event, at the Kalamazoo Air Zoo, was not open to the public, only invited fans.

Three months later, Harris now returns to Kalamazoo for a public rally as a presidential candidate in a close race.

Bringing “star power” to Kalamazoo

Luke Howell, creator of an online Kamala support page in Kalamazoo, said he believes Harris will bring accountability back to the president’s office. He and others are excited to attend the rally, Howell said.

“I’ve never had this much excitement, it’s awesome,” Howell said. He shared a URL to sign up to attend the rally and said over 500 people signed up through his link alone.

Howell talked about the unique association between Kalamazoo and Kamala because of their similar names, but he believes the connection runs deeper than that.

He likes how Harris has brought some new ideas to the race.

“She gets a little bit more of the middle class, of the struggles that we face,” Howell said. “I don’t think you get that with Trump.”

Michelle Zukowski-Serlin, 62, an organizer of the Kalamazoo Women’s March earlier this month, said the energy and enthusiasm for Harris is at levels she last saw for Obama.

A lot of people are working hard, she said, noting the strong play of the Harris campaign. Zukowski-Serlin, who is a candidate for Comstock Township trustee, is also handing out materials endorsing Harris for president as she goes door-to-door, she said.

“She has the courage to tell people the truth,” Zukowski-Serlin said of Harris. She is competent and bright. She understands the law, Zukowski-Serlin said.

Her husband, Troy Zukowski-Serlin, 60, is the chairman of the West Michigan Jewish Democrats and a Harris supporter.

“It’s trying to thread a very difficult needle,” he said when asked about Harris’s take on the Middle East war involving Israel. Zukowski-Serlin said she wanted to see the war end. He supports Israel, he said, but also hopes for a Palestinian state in the future.

It’s important that voters in places like Kalamazoo and Benton Harbor get out to the polls, he said, expecting a close race.

“It shows how important Kalamazoo is,” he said. “This is an opportunity for us to get some really good numbers for the blue side in what is largely a sea of ​​red around us.”

Kalamazoo trended bluer in 2020 compared to 2016. Hillary Clinton beat Trump in the city 72% to 22%, but Biden beat Trump in 2020 by a 77% to 21% margin.

Kalamazoo’s congressional district, however, remains red. Republican Bill Huizenga won the 4th District — which runs as far north as Ottawa County — in 2022 over Democrat Joseph Alfonso, 54 percent to 43 percent.

Obama and Harris together will bring “real star power” to Kalamazoo, Troy Zukowski-Serlin said.

Resident April Lynn Jackson is among those excited that Harris is coming to town. She agrees with Harris’ policies because they don’t deny her daughter and granddaughters rights, including bodily autonomy and the right to be in the LGBTQ community without restrictions on where they can work or live, she said.

“The women of this nation were awakened by the results of the 2016 presidential election,” Jackson said. “We’ve been networking nationwide ever since.”

Watching the women empower each other was “really a beautiful sight,” she said.

Harris came on the scene at a time when many Americans are ready for change, Jackson said.

“We are tired of living in a broken nation,” Jackson said. “Vice President Harris broke a glass ceiling in the last election, and I look forward to her breaking even more this election.”

Harris will be the only presidential candidate to host a campaign event in Kalamazoo in over a decade. Mitt Romney came to Kalamazoo in 2012. Before that, John McCain appeared here in 2008, and George W. Bush stopped campaign in 2004.

Trump, Harris and their surrogates spread the I-96 and I-75 corridors in Michigan, with many stops in southwest Michigan and the Grand Rapids area. But Saturday marks the first major visit to Kalamazoo County by any campaign this year other than Harris’ July 17 event.

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