VP Kamala Harris urges NC church to keep faith, avoid rumors ahead of Greenville rally
GREENVILLE, N.C. – Vice President Kamala Harris extolled members and visitors at a Greenville church on Sunday to keep their faith and help others in need before she headed to a rally at East Carolina University.
The congregation at Koinonia Christian Center Church stood and cheered as Harris took the stage. The vice president, recounting her conversation with the pastor prior to Sunday’s noon service, said “It does my heart and soul good” to be with the congregation.
“In times of crisis — and we’re looking at the images of the aftermath of the hurricane — it is easy in these moments of crisis to question our faith, to sometimes lose our faith for a moment, because what we see is so hard to see that we lose faith,” Harris said.
She also addressed rumors rampant on social media after the remnants of Hurricane Helene battered Western North Carolina, saying the people behind those rumors are “trying to gain some advantage for themselves.”
“The problem with this, beyond the obvious, is it’s making it harder to get people life-saving information if they’re led to believe they cannot trust” those trying to help, Harris said.
Former U.S. Rep. Eva Clayton, the first Black woman in Congress from North Carolina and a longtime advocate for Eastern North Carolina, attended the service.
U.S. Rep. Don Davis, a Snow Hill Democrat running for reelection in a swing district in the northeastern part of the state, greeted Harris at Pitt-Greenville Airport Sunday morning. Harris shook hands with Davis and they spoke for a few minutes after he met her at the bottom of the stairs as she got off the plane. They high-fived, and Harris got in the motorcade for the ride to the church.
Along the route, a man wearing a red Trump shirt watched her car roll by, according to a press pool report.
The visit to Greenville is part of a sweep this week in Eastern North Carolina that will also include former President Bill Clinton. On Saturday, Harris met with Black faith leaders, politicians and supporters for a private event at The Pit Authentic Barbecue in downtown Raleigh, helping to pack several aid-relief boxes for storm-ravaged Western North Carolina.
Rally at ECU
Harris is expected to appear Sunday afternoon at Williams Arena in ECU’s Minges Coliseum, according to a university news release. Supporters of the vice president began lining up outside the 7,100-capacity arena early on Sunday morning.
Jordyn Strupp, a senior studying political science and business management at ECU who is active with College Democrats on campus and at the state and national levels, said this year’s presidential race feels like the “closest it’s ever been in North Carolina.”
Strupp, 21, who has been knocking on doors around Greenville since last month for N.C. House candidate Claire Kempner, said she believes Harris has a “really good shot” of winning the state.
She said that on campus, very few students — next to none — were still undecided about who they were voting for.
U.S. Rep. Greg Murphy, a Republican from Greenville, called attention to rising inflation, illegal immigration and “two major wars” abroad in a statement issued before Harris arrived. Harris is “tied to the hip of President Biden,” he said.
“Her appearance is a reminder that we need to return President Trump to the White House. Eastern North Carolina knows Kamala Harris is not fit for the job and will vote accordingly,” Murphy said.
Koinonia Senior Pastor Rosie O’neal noted in introducing Harris that everyone may not have the same political opinions.
“There are things on all sides that we don’t agree with, but what I’ve asked you to do over the years is listen to the issues, then try to get a sense of the direction that the person would take our country in. Then, look at their service history, pray and ask the Lord,” O’neal said.
Election Day nearing
North Carolina is one of seven major battleground states that Harris and former President Donald Trump have been crisscrossing in recent weeks. Early voting starts Thursday in North Carolina and runs through Nov. 2. Harris’ Greenville visit came 23 days before the Nov. 5 election.
Trump, the Republican nominee for president, held a town hall in Fayetteville on Oct. 4, where he blasted the Biden administration’s response to the storm.
Harris and Trump, and their vice presidential picks — Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Republican Ohio Sen. JD Vance — have included the Tar Heel State in multiple campaign stops this year.
Those visits have been ramping up in the last few weeks, with Vance holding a town hall Thursday with voters in Greensboro. He was also expected to attend the Bank of America ROVAL 400 race at the Charlotte Motor Speedway on Sunday, according to WCNC Charlotte. This will be Vance’s third visit to Charlotte in less than a month.
On Saturday, the Trump campaign announced that Vance will hold a rally in Wilmington on Wednesday.
And on Sunday, the Harris campaign announced that Walz will make stops in Durham and Winston-Salem on Thursday as early voting begins, The News & Observer’s media partner, ABC-11, reported.
As part of her outreach in Eastern North Carolina, Harris is also tapping Clinton to stump for her. The former president will embark on a bus tour of the region targeting “hard-to-reach” rural voters between Oct. 17 and 20.
He’s expected to appear at small-scale events like “local fairs and porch rallies,” and will focus on the economy, CNN reported earlier this week.
As of Friday, the RealClearPolitics polling average showed that Trump has a very slim lead over Harris in North Carolina. The state has only supported Democratic presidential candidates twice in the last 50 years — former President Jimmy Carter in 1976 and former President Barack Obama in 2008.