Illinois voters discuss the Harris-Biden switch, her historic candidacy and more

(CHICAGO) — When President Joe Biden dropped out of the 2024 race, Edgar Diaz said his first thought was one of relief.

“Biden did great when he was [Barack] Obama’s running mate and then as he became president, he did a great job,” Diaz, a 43-year-old moderate Democrat who lives in Chicago, told ABC News. “But now I think he’s realized that, ‘Hey, you know what? Now it’s time to step aside and let somebody like Kamala Harris step in.'”

He wasn’t alone in that sentiment.

Four Illinois voters sat down with ABC News at the start of the Democratic National Convention to discuss Biden’s bombshell decision, the rise of Vice President Kamala Harris as the party’s nominee and her possible historic path to the presidency.

On Biden’s exit from the campaign

Valerie Jencks and Grace Walters, who also plan to support Harris in November, described feeling uplifted and reassured when Biden said he wouldn’t seek a second term in the White House.

Jencks, 61, recalled watching Biden as a senator during the Reagan administration discuss apartheid and how “vibrant he was and how passionate he was about about these issues.”

“Over the years, he has stayed true to the issues and values,” she said. “But I feel that the passion that’s required to bring us together again just wasn’t there. So I was very relieved, actually, when he bowed out.”

Walters, 25, said she immediately saw more energy and enthusiasm behind Harris and her agenda.

“That was encouraging to see,” she said. “It became less about vote for us because we’re not them, and more vote for us because we’re doing X, Y and Z — and that is always an easier thing to get behind.”

David Spada, a 53-year-old conservative Republican, asked those at the table whether they had any concern with how Harris came to be the nominee. Much of the Democratic Party quickly coalesced around her after Biden quickly endorsed her to take his place, and no challenger to her candidacy emerged.

“But don’t you have a problem with the party picking Kamala, where, again, the Democratic voters didn’t pick the candidate,” Spada asked. “Shouldn’t the voters pick who the candidate is for president, not just the party?”

On Harris’ rise to the nomination

Before she became Biden’s vice president, Harris unsuccessfully ran for the party’s nomination in the 2020 Democratic primary. She exited the field before the first votes were cast in the Iowa caucus.

This time, however, she’s managed a positive campaign rollout that has her polling better against former President Donald Trump than Biden did.

“I think Kamala is resonating with the voters this time around much, much better because we’re familiar with her work,” said Jencks. “And I also believe that she has hit her stride in being able to publicly present herself and her thoughts and her ideas.”

Walters said she believed Harris’ background as an attorney general may have been too much of a focus in 2020, when protests against racism and police brutality were central to the political landscape.

“I think there’s been enough distance since her work as a prosecutor that people aren’t really talking about it as much,” she said. “There’s less ‘Kamala is a cop’ discourse on Twitter or whatever. I do still think some of that is maybe salient to look at with regards to her political record, but she definitely seems like the younger, more appealing pick, as opposed to Biden.”

Diaz, though, said he thought her prosecutorial skills were being portrayed in a different light to present Harris as an overall “fighter.”

“She is not afraid to go against big corporations, and sit down at the table with them and try to negotiate something,” he said. “I think that brings a lot of joy to a lot of our folks and a lot of passion. And I think that’s why she’s surging, she resonates with a lot of us.”

On Harris’ historic candidacy

While Harris could make history as the first woman elected president, voters said it wasn’t at the center of their support and they’re glad to see it’s not a focal point for the Harris campaign either.

“I think it’s cool that it hasn’t been a major thing of note,” said Walters. “That she’s the first is kind of exciting, but that it’s more about her policy than it is about her gender is even more exciting to me.”

Diaz said he was glad his daughter, who is 13, is seeing Harris and other women already serving in positions of power.

“At least it shows gender is not going to be an issue, it’s who’s the best person to lead this nation,” he said.

Spada, the lone Republican at the table, agreed.

“I just want the best candidate, man or woman,” he said.

“If she’s Black, she’s Indian, she’s a woman — it doesn’t matter. You just got to look at her policies, just like I would look at Nikki Haley’s policies if she was running, like you got to look at Trump’s policies as he’s running again,” Spada said.