Follow The Atlanta Journal-Constitution's political team as it reports this week from the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia. Stay on top of the developments by following our special convention page at http://www.myajc.com/2016-democratic-convention/. You can also follow us on Twitter at https://twitter.com/GAPoliticsNews or Facebook at https://facebook.com/gapoliticsnewsnow. To see coverage from last week's Republican National Convention in Cleveland, go to http://www.myajc.com/2016-republican-convention/.
Georgia House Minority Leader Stacey Abrams got a rousing applause Monday at the Democratic National Convention for her forceful defense of Hillary Clinton, declaring her to be a leader for a “new American majority.”
Abrams told the delegates about her hardscrabble upbringing in Mississippi in a family that was “hit time and again by economic insecurity that was too often driven by racism, sexism and the ills that come with being born in the wrong ZIP code.”
“No matter how little we may have had, there was always someone with less,” said Abrams, long considered a potential candidate for higher office in Georgia. “And it was our job to serve that person. To know that even the most powerful among us, the strongest among us, did not rise up alone.”
Then Abrams launched into her case for Clinton, who she said “understands that government at all levels is a profound expression of our shared values … of our aspirations, not our fears.”
Said Abrams, invoking some of her party’s fights in Georgia:
“I’m here today as part of a new American majority, one that has the courage to work together rather than tear our nation apart. We are the architects of a solution to help families raise healthy children and make a living wage, rather than crippling our economic future and pushing dangerous policies that deny Medicaid expansion and reproductive choice. We fight for more because that is who we are.”
— Greg Bluestein
Clarkston mayor helps halt booing
Taunts from “boo birds” fell off dramatically early in the evening Monday at the Democratic convention.
Clarkston Mayor Ted Terry, a Bernie Sanders delegate, said the senator’s call to supporters to be polite had had an effect. And where it didn’t, his supporters sometimes took care of things.
Terry said he had to “remind North Dakota Bernie delegates that Senator Sanders said not to boo. They haven’t booed since.”
Terry said he raised the issue “nicely but firmly” after listening to a “small cluster of North Dakota ‘Bernie or bust’ ” people boo for two hours.
— Aaron Gould Sheinin
Franklin presents party’s platform
Former Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin spoke briefly to convention Monday to present the party’s proposed platform.
Franklin, the co-chairwoman of the committee that drafted the document over the past several months, called the work that went into the platform the “most open and transparent process in our party’s history.”
“We drafted the most progressive platform ever,” Franklin said. “It’s a bold vision for working families, social justice and the continuing prosperity and security of our country, and it’s reflective of our party as Democrats, the party of inclusion.”
When it finally came up for a voice vote, the delegates shouted loudly in approval.
— Aaron Gould Sheinin
Lewis given speaking slot
The list of Georgia speakers at the Democratic National Convention just keeps growing.
U.S. Rep. John Lewis of Atlanta will address delegates at 5 p.m. Tuesday, the same day that Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed and former state Sen. Jason Carter of Atlanta also grace the stage at the Wells Fargo Arena.
“It’s a bold vision for working families, social justice and the continuing prosperity and security of our country and it’s reflective of our party as Democrats, the party of inclusion,” Franklin said.
Carter will introduce a video of his grandfather, former President Jimmy Carter.
By the way, Lewis, that noted veteran of the nonviolent civil rights movement, was also named Monday as a sergeant-at-arms for the convention.
— Aaron Gould Sheinin
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