The Democratic National Convention (DNC) recently took place from August 19th to the 22nd. This convention is held every four years to nominate the Democratic Party candidates for the upcoming elections. On the last day of the convention, Vice President Harris accepted her party’s nomination. This marks her as the first African American and South Asian woman to be named a major-party presidential nominee. The convention was endless, and the topics ranged from abortion laws and regulations to environmental policies. 

Reproductive Rights
On the very first day of the 3-day meeting, abortion was front and center at the convention. There were three guests—two women and one man—who shared their experiences since Roe v. Wade had been overturned. On Wednesday, Mini Timmaraju, who is in charge of the Reproductive Freedom for All, spoke on the matter along with Cecile Richards, who is the former Planned Parenthood leader, and the current leader, Alexis McHill Johnson.

This presented a significant front because, in the past, the Republican Party would present their anti-abortion speakers while the Democratic Party would stay silent on the matter. The Democratic Party presents these speakers in hopes of moving their campaign while getting more pro-choice voters. 

Democrats say their goal for abortions is to keep them “safe, legal, and rare.” 70% of voters, including women who are of reproductive age, agree that abortion should be made legal and are wanting the restoration of Roe v. Wade.

The Democrats report that if elected, they will “pass national legislation to make the law of the land again.” Under this category, they also emphasized that IVF would also be protected, and they would repeal the Hyde Amendment, which banned the use of any federal funds for the use of an abortion. In theory, this will support access to FDA-approved medication abortion. 

Healthcare
Staying on the topic of healthcare, the Democratic Party uploaded a 92-page policy that covers where they stand on their healthcare policy.. 

More speakers were brought in to speak on this topic. One of the speakers mentioned the drug costs; he mentions, “We finally beat Big Pharma.” The Democrats plan on expanding healthcare to dental, vision, and hearing. They plan on continuing to cut the price of medicine, as they have already begun to decrease insulin prices. New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D) brought to light that Trump plans on repealing the Affordable Care Act and wants to eliminate protections for conditions that are preexisitng. Democrats are against this completely and plan to continue supporting this act. 

Along with this, the DNC spoke on healthcare rights for LGBTQ+. They have promised to undo the Trump administration’s “discriminatory actions against the LGBTQ+ community, including the dangerous and unethical regulations allowing doctors, hospitals, and insurance companies to discriminate against patients based on their sexual orientation or gender identity.” In this, they have sworn to restore healthcare and insurance protections for LGBTQ+ people and whoever is living with HIV/AIDS. 

Their plan is to expand the Affordable Care Act and support the “21 million people currently signed up for health coverage through the ACA and note that it has reduced the rate of uninsured Americans from 16% in 2010 to 8% in 2024.”

Border/Immigration
Donald Trump is campaigning around mass deportation. This is significantly different from the policies of Harris’s. This is not a surprise, as the two parties have never aligned around these views. Harris’s platform plans to secure the border; this includes reforming the asylum system and the temporary emergency authority to shut down the border.  

The Democratic Platform revolves around expanding legal immigration and protecting long-time residents from deportation. They brought up one policy, “The U.S. Citizenship Act,” which would permanently increase family-sponsored and employment-based immigration by over 200,000 in 5 years plus.  

Some things that were left out were the long waits for employment-based immigrant visas. 

The platform will honor President Biden’s administration’s humanitarian parole programs for people in Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela. Ana Navarro, another welcome speaker at the convention, mentioned her first point of view and her experience with communism. “I fled communism from Nicaragua when I was eight years old,” she said. “And let me tell you what communist dictators do. And it’s never just for one day. They attack the free press.”

A study by the National Foundation for American Policy found that the programs that had been implemented reduced illegal entry. After these humanitarian parole programs were introduced, Border Patrol incidents declined by over 90% among Hatians, Cubans, and Nicaraguans from December 2022 to November 2023. The study also found that these programs were much safer and more effective for participants. 

Environmental policies
The topic of climate change had been briefly brought up in the convention before. But, on the last day of the DNC’s, Kamala Harris tied climate change to her campaign theme of freedom. 

Harris failed to offer any new policies for climate change. What she did mention is that the fight against climate change is “patriotic,” and we should treat it like fighting for our “freedoms.” 

Biden stated that climate change is not only an “existential threat,” but also “an enormous opportunity. This is an opportunity for America to lead the world in clean energy and create millions of new, well-paying jobs in the process.”

There were more speakers introduced during this topic. The first is Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, who is a Florida representative who was backing the idea of fighting against climate change. There were two other speakers: Maxwell Frost and John Russell. Russell, one of many content creators who attended the Democratic National Convention, mentioned that the benefits of fighting climate change could be seen in our economy. 

Climate change is finally beginning to take priority on the lists of these politicians. Nanish Bapna. The president of the NRDC Action Fund mentioned, “Climate was not a campaign issue eight or 12 years ago. It was extremely difficult to get climate into one of the major debates; it was seen as a peripheral and not a central issue.”