More than 30,000 Houstonians – the majority of them Black – showed up to support Vice President Kamala Harris’ Oct. 25 campaign rally at the Shell Energy Stadium, determined to be part of a historic night. More than 1.5 million people registered but security capped the entry at 30,000 attendees – marking the Houston rally the largest event in the Harris campaign. A large electronic board flashed slogans that said “Trust Women,” “Vote,” “Freedom,” and “Vote for Reproductive Freedom.” The star-studded rally saw the biggest cameo: Beyoncè Knowles-Carter’s endorsement of Harris as the first mixed-race woman President of the United States.
Beyoncè walked hand-in-hand with “sister” and former bandmate Kelly Rowland and addressed a cheering crowd. The New York Times and Siena College poll found Trump and Harris deadlocked at 48 percent to 48 percent. To aim for a strategic vantage point and an edge over Trump, the Harris campaign sought Beyoncé’s status in her hometown in Houston while focusing on the singular issue of abortion rights.
“I’m not here as a celebrity,” Beyoncé said. “I’m not here as a politician. I’m here as a mother, a mother who cares deeply about the world my children and all of our children live in.”
She also talked about the generational impact of abortion rights in the country.
“Imagine our daughters growing up, seeing what’s possible with no ceilings, no limitations,” she said. “Imagine our grandmothers, imagine what they feel right now. Those who have lived to see this historic day. Even those who are no longer physically with us. Imagine all of their sacrifices made so we can witness the strength of a woman.”
While the heat got the better of some attendees who fainted, the energy was palpable. The stadium was bustling, with people dancing to popular tracks, lit up bracelets on their wrists that led the DJ to say, “It’s starting to feel like a blue wave.” Songs jumped from a Beyoncé medley and Rihanna’s “Pour it Up” to Queen’s “We Will Rock You.”
What Harris said
Vice President Kamala Harris knew what she had to focus on in Texas, as she flew to Houston after a series of campaigns in swing states. In Ruby red Texas, the fight for abortion rights is a part of the prevalent anti-conservative policy discourse that Democrats are trying to harness as an electoral weapon. Today’s rally saw Harris warning Texans that if Trump comes to power, these policies may not only be contained in red states.
In this regard, abortion might be the one issue that finally mends the deep rift between Republican voters and “double-haters” who are hesitant to vote for either Harris or Donald Trump. Harris leaned into it in Houston, the sole focus of her speech being reproductive healthcare.
All speakers at the event: Beyoncé’, Kelly Rowland, country musician Willie Nelson and Rep. Colin Allred, women who failed to receive abortion care since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, and a group of obstetricians echoed the importance of the singular issue of reproductive freedom in the state.
“Tonight is here because we are about fighting for our future and not, and in America, we know freedom is not to be given. It is not to be bestowed,” she said. “It is ours by right. And we’re prepared to fight for it ’cause we understand the stakes.”
She also said Texas is ground zero in this fight, for which voters “must be loud” and must organize and mobilize. “Texas is home to one of the most restrictive abortion bans in our country. In Texas. Abortion is banned from the moment of conception. Doctors and nurses could go to prison for life simply for providing reproductive care. Think about that.”
Key moments from the rally
Actress Jessica Alba kickstarted the rally, after which country singer Willie Nelson, who referred to Harris as “Madame President,” performed.
“As a woman, I know we need a leader like Kamala Harris who is dedicated to protecting reproductive freedom, ensuring that decisions about your body are made by you, never by the government, because Kamala Harris understands that protecting reproductive freedom isn’t about politics, it’s about our right to choose,” Alba said.
A group of obstetricians lined up on stage as a sign of protest against former President and this year’s presidential candidate Donald Trump’s intention to introduce a nationwide abortion ban. Dr. R. Todd Ivey, an OB/GYN from Houston, expressed his frustrations with not being able to provide abortion care for critical patients. Women in 14 states with abortion bans cannot get medical care until their condition becomes life-threatening.
“As a physician, I cannot describe the anguish of not being able to help my patients and the fear of spending the rest of my life behind bars. Each physician here with me tonight has multiple agonizing stories to tell, and some of them involve their own pregnancies,” he said.
Former NFL linebacker and Rep. Colin Allred, who is running against Republican Sen. Ted Cruz in the Texas Senate race, recalled his harrowing experience during the Jan. 6 insurrection when the mob stormed the Capitol. Allred, who has benefited from the support of Houston’s historically Black churches, said he texted his wife, who was seven months pregnant with their son, trying to assure her he will be okay. Everyone looked to him for help. “I went to public school in Texas, I wasn’t just gonna sit there. So I took off my suit jacket, and I was prepared to defend the house floor from that mob,” he said, adding Cruz was “hiding in the supply closet” during this time.
“If you are singularly responsible for taking away a fundamental freedom from Texas women because you think you know better than Texas women and their families and their doctors, and you put in place this abortion ban and you celebrate this abortion ban, you introduce at the national level five times a nationwide abortion ban, then you are gonna lose your job,” he said, while the crowd echoed “you are gonna lose your job.”
Women share their testimonies
Several women who failed to receive reproductive health care since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade came forward to share their stories and advocate for abortion rights in Texas.
The mother of Amber Thurman, a woman in Georgia who died upon not receiving care after the state’s abortion ban, spoke at the rally.
Andrea Gallegos from San Antonio said in the fall of 2022, she found out she was pregnant. Her water broke one evening too early into her pregnancy, and after going to the ER, her OB/GYN learned that her pregnancy was not viable. She was told to wait at the hospital, and her daughter was born five days after her water broke. But, she lived only for a few minutes. After the hospital discharged her, she felt severe pain from sepsis and went into a six-hour emergency surgery, nearly losing her life.
“It’s taken many months of physical and emotional healing to get where I am today. I have come forward so people can learn from my experience and the experiences of other women who have been impacted by these laws,” she said at the rally. “Texas abortion bans unleashed by Donald Trump almost cost me my life and have left me with physical and emotional scars. I’m here to advocate for the women who are unable to share their truth, for the many black and brown women whose pain is often dismissed and disregarded.”
Top 3 issues for the attendees
The Defender spoke with several rally-goers, many of whom had been waiting in line for hours on end. Among the attendees, the top issues were abortion rights and women’s bodily freedom, immigration, and economic stability.
Here are a few takeaways from Houstonians
“The first number one priority is getting our rights restored as women. We don’t believe that anybody, especially old decrepit men who’ve already had children, should tell me or anybody else, especially a woman, what to do with their bodies. And a kicker to that is they’re not telling men that they can’t have vasectomies, but they’re telling women that they can’t do whatever they want with their bodies. The next thing is I want her to focus on the economy. She has great plans. She’s gonna help with housing, she’s gonna help with the down payment, $50,000 tax credit for people to start new businesses. That’s gonna kick start our economy. And then the third thing that Kamala Harris should focus on is immigration. She should rekick that bipartisan bill that Donald Trump dumped and sign it. Does Donald Trump really care about immigration like he’s acting? No, it’s just a talking point. And I just want to say this. He has immigrants working at all of his places of business. Go and check it out. So how are you so anti-immigrant?”
- Olivia Taylor, interior designer and owner of food truck business
“In Texas, we have to take care of the gerrymandering process, how it disenfranchises the voters. Let’s just be straight and simple. The electoral colleges is just a cheating system that allows people to use certain states in order to use all the power. Then the second thing is just understanding that women should have control over their bodies. My lady should have control over her body. And the third thing is just to bring the country back together. At the end of the day, we just have to think of the simple fact that any oppression anywhere is oppression, we should always suppress that. So that’s a bad thing, especially when we’re dealing with a situation where anybody feels like they’re oppressed.”
- Shomari Franks, mortgage loan officer and professor at Texas Southern University (TSU)
“The top three issues for me are bodily autonomy. I have four sisters, and I feel that it’s very important that my sisters are able to make their own decisions for their own body. The second issue is healthcare. I work in healthcare and I see the different disparities around Houston. For example, we have this wonderful Texas Medical Center, but how many Houstonians are insured and have access to that level of care? And number three, just the general economy, I want to see everybody be successful and uplifted out of poverty. The current administration has attempted to do that, so I hope the future administration will do the same.
- Brandon Sterling, nurse
“I’d like to see the Roe v. Wade decision reversed. I know that’s unlikely, but that’s a big issue for me. I’d like to see a lot more corporate crackdowns in terms of regulations, especially in Texas. It’s a big deal here with corporate subsidies getting handed out like candy from the government to companies that don’t represent the future of our country or the world. And the third issue, if I’m gonna be honest I view this election as a turning point because the opposition represents an existential threat to American democracy, and that’s probably the biggest thing for me. I don’t want to fall into that camp of Trump bad, so I’m not voting Trump, but it really comes down to that. I mean, this is somebody that tried to overthrow our government and whether or not I am even a Harris voter or not, I’m gonna vote for her, because the opposition threatens the very core values of what it means to be an American.”
- Colin, looking for employment in the field of psychology
“Women’s bodies are top of mind for me, quality education is paramount and the economy, ensuring people have jobs and can have a liberal wage and can make a living for themselves.”
- Arlene, a development coach.
“Being a woman and raising a young lady, I’m not only voting for myself, but I’m voting for my daughter. In Texas, I feel there’s times where compared to the rest of the country, Texas has its own laws. It’s been kind of hard and you can see the contrast to other women, like Jersey and New York, you definitely see the contrast.”
– Jonah, HR for a civil engineering company
“I think that the economy, having somebody in the top office that has a lot of decorum and just a flat out better person, that’s the reason I’m here and because it’s a historic direction. I would like to see change for all people, not just Black people because all of us have the same struggles basically. When you have hurricanes and other things, it doesn’t matter if you’re Black or white, everybody needs the same assistance.”
- Theresa Beverly Prince, program manager at UT Health
“For me, I need a leader that cares about everybody and not just themselves, and also about reproductive rights and not having the government make decisions about our bodies.”
- Tawana Espree, small business owner
“For me, it’s just character that matters and how you behave as a human being. That says a lot to me. As a woman, I want my kids to look up to the president, not look down to the office of the president.”
- Luz Ramirez, accountant
