Democratic National Convention, the final day: �When there are no ceilings, the sky’s the limit,’ Clinton says

Thanks for sticking with us for the last two weeks. From the first balloons being hoisted to the arena ceiling in Cleveland to the last being dropped on cheering delegates in Philadelphia, we’ve had a blast.

We hope you join us on the rest of the journey, as our politics team covers every twist and turn on the campaign trail over the next 101 days.

You can find our coverage every day on Trail Guide.

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Jan Brown, 67, of Roseville, a retired U.S. Air Force captain whose children are veterans and active duty military officers:

On Hillary Clinton’s qualifications: “I am so proud that Hillary Clinton is going to be commander and chief. I know that she’ll take care of my kids,” Brown said. “She is beyond a doubt the most qualified person I’ve ever seen for this job and I can hardly wait for the next 102 days to work every single day to make sure we get the votes to make sure that she wins.”

On Clinton’s historic nomination: “When she walked out it was like all the dreams of all the little girls who want to do everything and for too often were told what they can’t do, instead of what they can. Just seeing her come out and when she accepted the nomination it was like, finally, finally we made it.”

Words like “our,” “America” and “your” consistently rank among the most-used words in the speeches made by the major party candidates at their conventions. To see how similar, or different, this year’s candidates were from the past, we compared Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton’s acceptance speeches to all Republican and Democratic presidential candidates since 1980. Check out how they rank among their peers.

Former Democratic National Committee secretary Alice Germond, 73, of West Hollywood:

On the speech: “I thought it was warm, I thought it was caring, I thought it was smart and I thought it just hit all the right buttons. It wasn’t negative, it wasn’t angry, it wasn’t bitter. It had humor, it had laughter. I just thought she did a great job.”

On the experience: “There’s just been sort of those poignant moments, where you look up, somebody says something up on the stage or sitting next to you or you see a little glimmer or a kid and you go, �Oh God, we just nominated the first woman of a major party,’” Germond said. “It’s sort of breathtaking. It hits you in waves.

“To me, it’s just glorious. Something I’ve fought for all my life,” she said. “It’s particularly magical.”

Cathleen Decker, who analyzes politics for The Times, took to Twitter tonight for an instant analysis of the Republican and Democratic conventions. Here’s what she had to say, in 21 tweets:

1. Conventions have a specific purpose: to sell or redefine.
2. To the extent that people watched, there was tons of testimony from people about HRC’s good deeds/warmth, that helps redefinition.
3. Tons of time was spent emphasizing Donald Trump, and what speakers from Obama on down see as the threat he poses to America.
4. That went beyond the usual criticism to ground-floor level impact he would have on democracy, in their view, imperiling it.
5. The question now is whether Trump and Clinton are so well known that no further definition, for good or bad, will stick.
6. Hundreds of millions of dollars will be spent on ads. Will we still have at the end two highly unpopular candidates, a coin flip?
7. Or will one candidate have dramatically reshaped his/her image over the course of the four days each spent in convention hoo-haw.
8. Some observations: This was Clinton’s best big speech. Well written and delivered well. Akin to challenge/execution by GHW Bush in 1988.
9. Both Bush and Clinton were seeking office after two terms of a popular same-party president who’d overshadowed them. Both delivered.
10. In Bush’s case, his success at the convention speech improved his future speechmaking/communication. Will this do the same for Clinton?
11. Other observations: Staging of Clinton’s convention speech was lush. Flags of different sizes, signs, color scheme all worked together.
12. People can laugh at things like that but they translate in voters’ minds. Staging at GOP convention felt more haphazard; speakers too.
13. The theatrics of it all won’t matter in a blow-out. But they can matter in a close race. After this year, is anyone betting against that?
14. Viewers of all convention hours saw tons of people testifying for Clinton or against Trump. You can bet the ads have already been cut.
15. That brings up another Clinton advantage: A team that has done this before. Crispness, efficiency, knowing where to get voters, helps.
16. Tonight also was something of a Sista Soulja night for Dems: Army general/military endorsing HRC, gun control a big part of her speech.
17. Also worth noting: Chelsea Clinton + other speakers offered reams of personal anecdotes about Hillary. Not even Trump’s kids did much.
18. Personal anecdotes may not matter; the combo of anti-Clinton and economy woes may negate. Just like no minds may change on Trump.
19. But re the conventions, Clinton helped herself on a personal level. On a policy level, too little talk of the economy, seems to me.
20. And Trump had a rocky convention and has worked to obliterate any gains with his talk about Russia and continued belligerence.
21. As to what it all adds up to, voters will decide in November. That’s why they call it “democracy.” A bipartisan suggestion: Vote.

(Sarah D. Wire/Los Angeles Times)

Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s former U.S. Senate colleague, California Sen. Barbara Boxer, was effusive about Thursday night’s acceptance speech.

“This is the Hillary I know. She has that sense of humor, that dry sense of humor. She’s so smart, she’s so strong, so resilient,” Boxer said. “She really showed the American people what kind of leader she’ll be.

“She’s been hit so hard, I’m sure she thinks, what else can they do? I’m going to be myself,” Boxer added.

The historic nature of the speech was moving to Boxer.

“What Hillary proved tonight, that a woman can be just what America needs in a leader: strong, but with a big heart. Someone who understands how to nurture a daughter and nurture a nation, and I’m really just very moved and touched with what she said, by the response to it and really the whole convention. It was remarkable.”

Favorite line: Boxer said she liked when Clinton said, “No, you don’t, Donald.”

“It was just like a mom telling a kid, �Respect your elders.’ It was so well done,” she said.

Nic McCarthy, a 27-year-old delegate from Virginia, wasn’t planning to vote for Hillary Clinton before she started her acceptance speech. He even shouted at her during the speech, telling her to “walk the walk.”

But by the time she finished speaking, the Bernie Sanders supporter had a change of heart.

“I don’t like her. I don’t trust her,” McCarthy said. “But we have got to push for some of these issues we have to make sure she walks the walk, even if we have to lift her feet every step of the way.”

The only way to do that, he decided, was to vote for her and keep Donald Trump out of office.

Tim Weaver, a 34-year-old delegate from Texas, said he’s leaving the convention feeling more confident about voting for Clinton, and not just because of her speech.

“A lot of people that I trust have spoken for her,” Weaver said, including President Obama and Vice President Joe Biden.

A fellow Texas delegate, Emily Wells, 34, said she’d also vote for Clinton.

“It will be a frustrating, begrudging vote, but we can’t let Donald Trump be president,” she said.

Wells added, “I have more problems with the system than with Hillary Clinton.”

Not everyone was convinced. Diana Orozco-Garrett, a 58-year-old delegate from New Mexico, said she was just as conflicted after the speech as she was before.

“There are consequences for people I know if Donald Trump wins,” she said, referring to his support for deportations of immigrants in the country illegally. “But there are other dangers and concerns for another set of people if Hillary wins.”

Orozco-Garrett is worried that Clinton will push through the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a massive trade deal, even though she said she opposes it.

Hillary Clinton’s acceptance speech was a lot like the woman herself: serious, comprehensive, competent – but not quite poetic. And weighted with the heavy burden of convincing skeptics set against her.

Clinton touched all the bases a Democratic nominee needs to touch, from equal rights for women, minorities and LGBT people to immigration reform. From military strength to gun control.

She repeated her campaign’s benign but pallid slogan, “stronger together”; her favorite line about playing the woman’s card, “deal me in”; her favorite Methodist precept, “Do all the good you can, for all the people you can.”

Most important, she tried to solve her party’s central problem: the perception by many voters that establishment Democrats (which is what she is) don’t grasp the economic hardship and social dislocation that ordinary people feel in the eighth year of the Obama presidency.

“Some of you are frustrated, even furious,” she said. “You know what? You’re right…. We haven’t done a good enough job.”

And she tried to convince disgruntled followers of Bernie Sanders that she agrees that economic inequality is the product of a political system swamped in special-interest money: “I believe our economy isn’t working the way it should because our democratic isn’t working the way it should,” she said.

But judging by the response of Sanders delegates, many of whom booed or heckled or waved protest signs, she still has a distance to go.

And so, half a dozen times, she pivoted to the inevitable contrast with her erratic opponent, Donald Trump.

“A man you can bait with a tweet is not a man we can trust with nuclear weapons,” she said in one of many, many barbs.

In the end, that was her main theme, at least by volume, and will probably be the main theme of her campaign: You may or may not love Hillary Clinton – but that’s not the question you face. The question is whether you’d rather be ruled by Donald Trump.

Republicans found a lot to criticize in Hillary Clinton’s speech on the final night of the Democratic National Convention.

Donald Trump’s campaign sent out a statement calling the speech an “insulting collection of cliches and recycled rhetoric” that was “delivered from a fantasy universe, not the reality we live in today.”

Some like Florida senator and onetime Republican presidential hopeful Marco Rubio found problems with Clinton’s policy proposals.

Others focused on the discord happening inside and outside the arena as some delegates heckled Clinton on the convention floor while protesters outside burned an American flag.

Some leveled another criticism: Coming a night after President Obama’s well-received speech, Clinton’s was simply boring.

Trump campaign spokeswoman Katrina Pierson pushed back at Clinton’s oft-used line that “it takes a village” to raise a child. Clinton re-purposed the line, also the title of one of her books, to criticize Trump’s assertion that only he could fix the country’s ills.

The GOP’s Twitter account put out a video featuring a polygraph machine in a darkened room with a message displayed across the screen as it fades to black: “We need a president who tells the truth.”

Other Republicans shared reports of protesters booing Clinton and burning flags. Rubio declared the convention a “disaster.”

Other conservative commentators ended the night frustrated with the two candidates in the election, including John McCormack, who in March penned a column for the Weekly Standard titled “How Trump Can Be Stopped.”

Conservative writer Erick Erickson vowed in a February article “I Will Not Vote For Donald Trump. Ever.”

On Thursday night he found one point of admiration for Democrats: They seemed to have found a viable way to attack Trump.

California Republican political consultant Matt Rexroad was sure of one thing: September’s debate would be “crazy.”

As she accepted the Democratic presidential nomination on Thursday, Hillary Clinton castigated GOP rival Donald Trump for short-changing small businesses in his pursuit of wealth.

“In Atlantic City, 60 miles from here, you’ll find contractors and small businesses who lost everything because Donald Trump refused to pay his bills,” Clinton said at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.

“People who did the work and needed the money, and didn’t get it — not because he couldn’t pay them, but because he wouldn’t pay them,” Clinton said. “That sales pitch he’s making to be your president? Put your faith in him — and you’ll win big. That’s the same sales pitch he made to all those small businesses. Then Trump walked away, and left working people holding the bag.”

It’s a statement backed in fact, according to investigations by USA Today and the Wall Street Journal.

“Donald Trump often portrays himself as a savior of the working class who will �protect your job.’ But a USA Today Network analysis found he has been involved in more than 3,500 lawsuits over the past three decades — and a large number of those involve ordinary Americans … who say Trump or his companies have refused to pay them,” read the June USA Today story.

Earlier this week, Trump said he quickly paid contractors who did their job well, but threatened to not pay the bill for renting event space at the Hotel Roanoke & Conference Center in Virginia because he said the room was hot.

“We’re in a ballroom and I feel like I’m in a sauna,” he said. “… I think the people who own this hotel should be ashamed of themselves.”

The Times’ Colleen Shalby reports that people on the floor at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia are “popping balloons like they never had permission to in their life.”

Here’s what the fireworks + balloon drop looked like in the room.

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Hillary Clinton took the stage Thursday night for the final and most anticipated act of the Democratic National Convention, building on a week of potent testimonials from the party’s biggest stars to reintroduce herself to voters as the first female presidential nominee from a major party and crystallize her vision for the nation.

In the address, she said, “With humility, determination and boundless confidence in America’s promise … I accept your nomination for president.”

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Pop music superstar Katy Perry crossed platforms into presidential politics on Thursday night, performing her aspirational new anthem, “Rise,” and in doing so sent a jolt of millennial energy into a convention eager to connect with a new generation of voters.

Perry — wearing a shiny, striped form-fitting dress — opened with comments about her background as the daughter of parents who were pastors and staunch Republicans.

“I don’t have a formal education,” she said, “but I do have an open mind and a voice.” She urged the crowd, and her fans, to vote because “you’ll be just as powerful as any NRA lobbyist. You’ll have as much say as any billionaire.” Or, she added, “you can just cancel out your weird cousin’s vote if you like.”

Perry also acknowledged her “closet full of Hillary-themed dresses” that she’s worn while campaigning for Clinton.

Standing before a microphone decorated in red, white and blue spangles, Perry opened with “Rise,” followed by another of her anthems, “Roar.”

Relatively speaking, her performance was a conservative affair. Over the years, after all, Perry has performed while sitting in a gigantic clam and in an oversize banana suit, and first gained fame with her coy nod to youthful experimentation, “I Kissed a Girl.” Why, then, would the Clinton campaign enlist her to perform during the convention’s apex? One reason is the mathematics of social media. In 2012, about 126 million people cast votes in the presidential election. Across three social media platforms — Instagram, Twitter and Facebook — Perry has a combined 215 million followers.

Hillary Clinton supporters in the California delegation are taking steps to quell backers of Bernie Sanders who have disrupted proceedings at the Democratic National Convention.

“The [California] Clinton delegates have responded by integrating the delegation, sitting next to other delegates and are determined to not let the few Sanders dead-enders speak for the whole delegation,” said a state party official who declined to be identified speaking on the record.

The delegation has high visibility because of its prime seating, and about 200 delegates back Sanders, a number of whom have been vocal about their displeasure with the Democratic Party. Party officials argued that it was a loud minority and not representative of the party.

“It’s a small group of people who have been generating the most attention. Most of the Sanders delegates now support her,” said the state party official, who said nearly two dozen Sanders’ supporters wore T-shirts that read: “Intersectionality matters.” “This protest has jumped the shark.”

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Rep. Xavier Becerra of California speaks at the Democratic National Convention. More convention coverage at latimes.com/trailguide

Los Angeles Rep. Xavier Becerra told a packed arena at the Democratic National Convention of his parents’ humble beginnings as immigrants from Mexico — and the threat he believes all immigrants will face if Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump is elected this November.

“We’ve come a long way from the days when my dad couldn’t walk into a restaurant because of the signs that read, �No dogs or Mexicans allowed,’” Becerra told Democrats inside the Wells Fargo Center on Thursday evening. “Now is not the time to turn back.”

Becerra, chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, has been a major political ally of Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. He has traveled state to state to help with her campaign’s outreach to Latino voters.

In his speech, the congressman characterized Trump as an out-of-touch man driven by greed who knows nothing about Americans who work hard every day to make ends meet.

“Does he know the price of a gallon of milk or a loaf of bread?” Becerra asked.

In contrast, he told the audience that Clinton has devoted her life to helping children, and listening to those who have little money or power.

“No matter who we are, or where we come from, or what we look like, or how much money we have, or who we love — Hillary Clinton walks with us,” Becerra told the crowd “So, now, the question is: Are we ready to walk with her?”

(Joshua Lott / Getty Images)

Donald Trump responded Thursday to scorching attacks by President Obama and others at the Democratic convention by saying they were “not talking about the real world” of Islamic terrorism, unchecked illegal immigration, rampant crime, a depleted military and U.S. jobs “pouring into Mexico.”

“Boy, am I getting hit,” the Republican presidential nominee complained to supporters at a rally in Davenport, Iowa.

Trump denied accusations that he’d outlined a dark vision of America last week at the GOP convention in Cleveland, saying he had offered a “very optimistic” prescription for overcoming the nation’s troubles.

The normally unbridled New York businessman was relatively subdued at the first of two Iowa campaign stops. He said he’d resisted the temptation to respond “viciously” to those attacking him at the Democratic gathering this week in Philadelphia.

“I was going to hit one guy in particular — a very little guy,” he said in an apparent reference to Michael R. Bloomberg, the former New York City mayor and political independent who branded Trump a “con” in a speech to Democratic delegates on Wednesday. “I was going to hit this guy so hard, his head would spin. He wouldn’t know what the hell happened.”

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Khizr Khan, the father of a soldier killed in Iraq, speaks at the Democratic National Convention.

Khizr Khan, the father of a soldier killed in Iraq, delivered an emotional speech to the Democratic National Convention on Thursday, saying to Donald Trump: “You have sacrificed nothing.”

Khan’s son Capt. Humayun S.M. Khan was killed in Iraq in 2004 when a vehicle filled with explosives tried to drive into the compound he was guarding. His actions that day were credited with saving lives. Khan is one of 14 American Muslims killed serving the U.S. military since the Sept. 11 attacks.

(Timothy A. Clary/AFP/Getty Images )

Khizr Khan spoke directly to Trump, who has proposed banning Muslim immigrants from entering the country.

“Let me ask you. Have you even read the United States Constitution?” he said, holding a copy in his hand. “I will gladly lend you my copy.”

The crowd in Philadelphia roared with approval as Khan continued, telling Trump to visit the graves of soldiers of “all faiths, genders and ethnicities” in Arlington National Cemetery.

Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton has spoken of Khan’s son on the campaign trail, telling the family’s story. The Khans moved from the United Arab Emirates to Boston in the 1980s.

Humayun Khan graduated from the University of Virginia and eventually joined the Army. He’d planned to be a military attorney. As a car packed with explosives sped toward his unit, Khan stepped in front of it. He was killed when the vehicle detonated. Khan was posthumously awarded the Bronze Star and Purple Heart.

Khizr Khan said Clinton “was right when she called my son �the best of America.’”

“If it was up to Donald Trump, he never would have been in America,” he said.

According to campaign officials, Hillary Clinton plans to cite her 1996 book, “It Takes a Village,” to bolster the point made by her and her surrogates that the idea has been a guiding principle throughout her life, not a politically expedient talking point.

Campaign officials said Clinton began thinking about the speech weeks ago, and she revised it even into Thursday.

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Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti speaks at the Democratic National Convention. More coverage at latimes.com/trailguide.

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti addressed the Democratic National Convention Thursday evening, delivering a short speech that was mostly given over to detailing his own biography, varied ethnic background and mayoral record for a national audience.

Garcetti’s first speech at his party’s national convention lasted roughly five minutes. Sandwiched between appearances by civil-rights activist Dolores Huerta and singer-songwriter Carole King in a pre-primetime speaking slot, Garcetti managed to deliver a few memorable jabs at Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump.

“America doesn’t need a political pyromaniac for president,” Garcetti said. “His voice is loud, his language is coarse, and his politics has a darkness that would not only stop but reverse the march of progress.”

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Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez was a featured speaker at the Democratic National Convention on Thursday night when she introduced a segment of speakers honoring police officers across the nation.

Valdez, who endorsed Hillary Clinton in February, introduced the families of fallen police officers. She is the first openly gay, Latina Democrat to be elected Dallas County sheriff.

The prime-time segment served as a key point of rebuttal for Democrats: Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has focused attention on police officers killed in the line of duty, including the four Dallas Police Department officers and one Dallas Area Rapid Transit officer who died in a shooting this month.

Earlier in the day, Trump’s campaign released a statement criticizing Democrats for ignoring law enforcement: “In the Democrats’ fantasy world...convention stages don’t need American flags, and our great men and women of law enforcement, our police, do not need to be honored.”

Valdez hit back.

“When my officers report for duty, they have no idea what might come up that day,” she said. “They don’t know whether the next 911 call will be their last. But they keep answering the call. They keep putting their lives on the line. They are doing the best they can to protect our communities. We put on our badges every day to serve and protect, not to hate and discriminate.

“Violence is not the answer,” she said. “Yelling, screaming and calling each other names is not going to do it. Talking within your own group in your language only your group understands leads nowhere. We have to start listening to each other.”

Valdez also led the convention hall in a moment of silence for the fallen officers.

Before the Mothers of the Movement gave their speeches at the Democratic National Convention, their appearance had caused controversy. The Philadelphia Fraternal Order of Police said its members were “shocked and saddened” that widows of fallen police officers were not included in the lineup.

“It is sad that to win an election, Mrs. Clinton must pander to the interests of people who do not know all the facts, while the men and women they seek to destroy are outside protecting the political institutions of this country,” the police group said in a statement.

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(Cheryl A. Guerrero / Los Angeles Times)

Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Torrance) says he never imagined he’d be speaking on stage at a national political convention.

Lieu, who emigrated from Taiwan at the age of 3, and whose parents sold trinkets and jewelry at flea markets to make ends meet, appeared on stage Wednesday along with fellow members of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus.

From the podium, he says, he was awe-struck by the magnitude of the crowd — and the diversity of the faces in the audience.

“It was incredible to be able to look out and see all the people,” Lieu told The Times by phone. “I wanted to sort of take out my cellphone and take a picture.”

He said he would resist that urge Thursday night, he added. Lieu took the stage in prime time to praise Hillary Clinton’s national security credentials.

Lieu, a colonel in the U.S. Air Force Reserves, says it’s imperative that voters elect a commander in chief with the temperament to lead.

“Who our commander in chief is is deeply important to me. We entrust the commander in chief with the lives of our service members, with the launch code to our nuclear weapons,” he said. “We need someone with a steady hand, who’s not brash, who doesn’t make stuff up.”

Lieu was first elected to Congress in 2014 and was president of his freshman class. Before joining Congress, he served in the state Legislature from 2005-14.

As she formally accepts her party’s nomination Thursday, Hillary Clinton will acknowledge the challenges facing the nation at a “moment of reckoning,” but declare that they can be overcome if Americans unite with common purpose.

“We are clear-eyed about what our country is up against. But we are not afraid,” she will say, according to advance excerpts provided by her campaign. “We will rise to the challenge, just as we always have.”

Clinton faces a high rhetorical bar as she closes out a four-day convention loaded with the party’s brightest stars. Aides say she has been working on her acceptance speech for weeks, making more changes Wednesday night after joining President Obama on stage after his remarks, and again today.

She will refer to Philadelphia’s role as the birthplace of the nation, and say that today, just as in 1776, “there are no guarantees” that forces threatening to pull the nation apart can’t succeed.

“It truly is up to us. We have to decide whether we’re going to work together so we can all rise together,” she will say.

Clinton will use the speech to outline her vision for the future, with her primary mission to “create more opportunity and more good jobs with rising wages right here in the United States.”

She’ll also discuss national security challenges and trouble spots abroad.

“From Baghdad and Kabul, to Nice and Paris and Brussels, to San Bernardino and Orlando, we’re dealing with determined enemies that must be defeated. No wonder people are anxious and looking for reassurance — looking for steady leadership,” she will say.

Addressing these challenges requires collaboration, she will say, drawing an implicit contrast with her rival who said in his acceptance speech a week before that “I alone” can tackle challenges.

“Every generation of Americans has come together to make our country freer, fairer, and stronger,” she said. “None of us can do it alone. That’s why we are stronger together.”

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Republican Doug Elmets speaks at the Democratic National Convention. More coverage at latimes.com/trailguide

The convention has been an opportunity for party leaders to trot out some big names in Democratic politics, but on Thursday night, two members of the opposing party will take the stage to make the case for Hillary Clinton.

First up is Doug Elmets, a longtime political consultant from Sacramento who served as a White House spokesman during the Ronald Reagan administration.

On stage, Elmets plans to call Trump a “petulant, dangerously unbalanced TV star,” he told The Sacramento Bee this week.

“I believe that four years of Hillary Clinton is better than one day of Donald Trump as president,” he told the newspaper. Elmets said he’ll be trying to persuade independents and fellow Republicans to cross party lines and vote for Clinton, a pitch Democrats made loud and clear Wednesday night.

Jennifer Pierotti Lim, who helped found the group Republicans for Hillary last May, will follow.

“It’s really important that Republican leaders, especially Republican women leaders, stand up right now and say we’re not OK with Trump representing our party,” Lim told CNN last month. “This was a long road for me to get here.”

Lim, who is director of health policy at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said she never imagined she’d be in this position. She told CNN that she planned to knock on doors, make phone calls and even donate to Clinton’s campaign, something she’s never done before.

Republican women who have become increasingly disenchanted with Trump are considered a major target bloc for the Clinton campaign.

On Wednesday night, a high-profile former Republican, former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, endorsed Clinton. Bloomberg, who was a Democrat before running for office as a Republican in 2001, now identifies as an independent.

We asked women of varying ages, backgrounds and political leanings what they make of Hillary Clinton, and this moment in history.

Some embrace her wholeheartedly, saying it is long past time for a woman in the Oval Office.

Some think the more meaningful barrier came down in 2008, when Americans elected the first black president.

Some are ambivalent; the symbolism is important, they say, but the candidate is lacking.

But there’s one thing on which they all can agree: No matter who becomes the 45th president, this is a watershed moment for women in America.

Here’s what we learned.

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As released by the campaign, here are portions of what Hillary Clinton plans to say tonight as the first woman to accept a major party’s nomination for president:

“America is once again at a moment of reckoning. Powerful forces are threatening to pull us apart. Bonds of trust and respect are fraying. And just as with our founders there are no guarantees. It truly is up to us. We have to decide whether we’re going to work together so we can all rise together.

“We are clear-eyed about what our country is up against. But we are not afraid. We will rise to the challenge, just as we always have.

“So I want to tell you tonight how we’re going to empower all Americans to live better lives. My primary mission as president will be to create more opportunity and more good jobs with rising wages right here in the United States. From my first day in office to my last. Especially in places that for too long have been left out and left behind. From our inner cities to our small towns, Indian Country to Coal Country. From the industrial Midwest to the Mississippi Delta to the Rio Grande Valley.

“The choice we face is just as stark when it comes to our national security. Anyone reading the news can see the threats and turbulence we face. From Baghdad and Kabul, to Nice and Paris and Brussels, to San Bernardino and Orlando, we’re dealing with determined enemies that must be defeated. No wonder people are anxious and looking for reassurance — looking for steady leadership.

“Every generation of Americans has come together to make our country freer, fairer, and stronger. None of us can do it alone. That’s why we are stronger together.”

The Revolution Club, the group behind the flag burning at last week’s Republican National Convention, was back again Thursday afternoon outside of the Democratic National Convention. The flag burning lasted just minutes in the rain.

Bernie Sanders supporters who have been protesting in Philadelphia since the start of the week distanced themselves from the event.

“Democratic socialist, peaceful protest!” a group chanted after the flag was burned.

Several people were upset that the media were giving the event any attention at all.

“This is pretty much the only time that we’ve had mainstream media sources coming up to cover anything out here, which is kind of what we’re offended about,” said one 19-year-old man, who identified himself only as “Emerson.”

Protesters have been outside of the gates of the convention center at a designated free-speech zone in Franklin Delano Roosevelt Park. Some Sanders delegates are expected to gather there during Hillary Clinton’s speech tonight. It’s unclear how many, if any at all, will participate in the so-called “Dem exit.”

Hours before Hillary Clinton was scheduled to take the stage to accept the Democratic nomination for president, Donald Trump lost a potentially decisive round in his prolonged fight against workers trying to unionize at his hotel in Las Vegas.

Trump has been stalling efforts to begin contract negotiations with workers at the Trump Hotel International Las Vegas after the 500 housekeepers and other service workers voted late last year to join the local Culinary Union 226 and Bartenders Local 165. The National Labor Relations Board certified the election in March.

In Thursday’s ruling, a three-member panel of the labor board denied Trump’s request for a review of the certification. That request marked Trump’s final recourse.

The workers are hoping to raise their pay by about $3 an hour. Last week his operation agreed to pay a more than $11,000 in a settlement in a case brought by workers who said they were punished for their union organizing efforts.

Trump’s battle with organized labor is a dicey move in Las Vegas, where many of the front-line service industry staff have long been represented by unions. The Culinary, as the union is known in the state, is a powerful player in turning out the vote for elections.

Trump workers led a protest on the Las Vegas Strip last week to highlight the dispute.

“We are pleased with the NLRB ruling, once again reaffirming that the union election at the Trump Hotel Las Vegas was fair and is certified,” said Geoconda Arguello-Kline, Secretary-Treasurer for the Culinary Union.

“We look forward to starting contract negotiations so that workers can have fair wages, job security, and good health benefits.”

Trump’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee is staying out of California’s U.S. Senate race to replace Sen. Barbara Boxer, so neither state Atty. Gen. Kamala Harris nor Rep. Loretta Sanchez of Orange are expected on the stage tonight when the committee recognizes those running for office.

Harris will be in the convention hall during Thursday’s proceedings, her staff said. Sanchez flew back to California Wednesday, according to her staff.

California’s top-two primary pitted two Democrats against one another in a Senate race for the first time in state history, creating a unique dance as party faithful weigh whether to pick sides in the race.

Sanchez’s campaign spokesman, Luis Vizcaino, said the congresswoman had always planned to attend the convention for just a few days so she could return to California and continue her Senate campaign.

“She’s been going to these things since the �90s,” Vizcaino said.

Sanchez appeared briefly on the convention stage earlier in the week, clasping hands with her sister and with their arms in the air as Linda Sanchez talked about being the only pair of sisters in Congress. Loretta Sanchez mingled with delegates in the California seating section, attended a Planned Parenthood luncheon and a did a few television interviews.

Harris, a comparative newcomer to national politics, has bounced from interviews with media outlets, speaking at breakfasts hosted by several states and attending panels about criminal justice and other topics.

Harris told reporters this week she’s trying to avoid the impression that she has the race locked up. In the June 6 primary, Harris received 40% of the vote and Sanchez nabbed 19% among the 34 candidates on the Senate ballot.

“I am very worried about that. This election cycle, the environment we’re in right now as a country, I think has made it clear that there is a lot of unpredictable [things] that have happened and probably will happen and we can’t take anything for granted,” she said. “That means that we have to work hard each and every day to guarantee that on Nov. 8, what we believe in should actually occur, but I take nothing for granted in this election cycle.”

Harris formally launched her campaign just days after Boxer announced she would not seek reelection in 2016, and quickly starting raising money. President Obama, Vice President Biden and California Gov. Brown have endorsed her.

Sanchez jumped into the contest five months later and has lagged in fundraising since.

In February, Harris won the coveted endorsement of the California Democratic Party, capturing 78.1% of the votes of party delegates after campaign volunteers lobbied throughout the state party’s convention in San Jose.

Rep. Tim Ryan of Ohio earned a strong speaking slot at the Democratic National Convention, and will use his address to accuse Donald Trump of “stabbing workers in the back for years.”

He represents a critical region in an important swing state, and has been a vocal campaigner for Hillary Clinton since her first presidential campaign in 2008.

According to excerpts released by Clinton’s campaign, Ryan will mock Trump’s promise to bring jobs back to the Midwest.

“Hey, Ohio – don’t buy it! This guy cut deals to make the Trump line of products in China, Mexico, Bangladesh! Not Youngstown, not Akron, not Niles,” Ryan will say, naming areas in his congressional district.

“If he really cared about our jobs, he would have hired some of our people.”

Earlier this year, there were some rumors that Ryan was under consideration to be Clinton’s running mate.

Ryan was first elected in 2002. He serves on the Appropriations Committee and is looked at as ambitious and potentially a statewide candidate in a future election. His strongly Democratic district is rarely competitive, so he often spends campaign years helping fellow Democrats up and down Ohio.

In 2012, not long after publishing a book on mindfulness, Ryan was busy campaigning for President Obama’s re-election in the Buckeye State.

I profiled him for Mindful magazine that year. I also wrote this piece when he published a second book about healthy eating and how food policy at the national level is a critical issue.

The congressman started the Quiet Caucus and regularly does yoga and meditation with colleagues on Capitol Hill.

Reducing the cost of a college education was a key focal point of Bernie Sanders’ campaign and many speakers at the DNC called for making college more affordable for all.

Tuition costs have become a prominent component of Clinton’s platform as well. Her plan calls for free tuition at in-state four-year public colleges and universities for students from families making no more than $85,000 a year. The program would expand to families earning $125,000 by 2021.

Here’s how student debt has grown over time:

As the cost of higher education rises ...

... families take on increasing amounts of student loan debt ...

... and student loan delinquencies outpace other types of debt

Source: College Board and Federal Reserve Bank of New York

Last October, Lorella Praeli told Times reporter Kate Linthicum she hoped to be able to vote for the first time in this election.

On stage tonight at the DNC, Praeli told the crowd: “I’m an American.”

Praeli, Latino outreach director for the Clinton campaign, came to the U.S. from Peru as a child to seek medical treatment after she was hit by a car and lost a leg. She lived here without without legal status until a few years ago when she obtained a green card through marriage.

“It was my undocumented mother who taught me what it means to be an American,” she said in Philadelphia.

Read more about her story >>

You would be forgiven if you thought the Democratic National Convention was really an awards show. The last few days included stars such as Alicia Keys, Meryl Streep and Angela Bassett introducing speakers or segments on policy proposals.

The final day of the convention will feature singer Katy Perry, “Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising” star Chloe Grace Moretz, as well as actors Ted Danson and Mary Steenburgen.

Moretz will speak before Rep. Xavier Becerra (D-Los Angeles) and Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown. The 19-year-old starlet has 9.5 million followers on Instagram has been an important millennial surrogate for Hillary Clinton, speaking to People Magazine and other publications about Clinton’s historic candidacy.

Danson and Steenburgen have attended California fundraisers for Clinton and traveled to New Hampshire this year to campaign for her. They will introduce a segment on the economy.

Pop star Katy Perry is well known for her outspoken support of President Obama and Clinton. She regularly wore Obama-themed dresses when she performed at rallies during the 2012 campaign.

She will perform in prime time Thursday before Clinton’s speech.

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Rep. Joaquin Castro of Texas speaks at the Democratic National Convention

Rep. Joaquín Castro of Texas took the stage at the Democratic National Convention Thursday, four years after his twin brother Julian Castro’s keynote address at the convention.

JoaquĂ­n Castro also shared the story of his grandmother, an orphan who fled Mexico for San Antonio.

The Castro brothers are among the nation’s most well-known Latino politicians and cast themselves as optimistic examples of what the children and grandchildren of immigrants can achieve in the the U.S.

Joaquín Castro tapped into that sentiment, attacking Donald Trump’s comments about Mexican immigrants.

“My grandmother believed that America was the greatest nation in the world, and I am with Hillary so our grandkids will believe the same thing too,” he said.

Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump can be given classified intelligence briefings now that they are the Democratic and Republican presidential nominees, the top U.S. intelligence official said Thursday, despite calls from party leaders to limit the other candidate’s access to national security secrets.

“We will brief both candidates if they want it,” James Clapper, the director of National Intelligence, said at the Aspen Security Forum in Aspen, Colo.

The candidates don’t need a security clearance to receive the briefing, Clapper said. He said they both are entitled to get classified information because they now are the major party nominees.

Sharing intelligence assessments with presidential nominees is a tradition that goes back to Harry Truman, who signed the law that created the CIA in 1947.

Senior officials in both parties have sought to turn this year’s closed-door briefings into a campaign issue.

After the FBI director said this month that Clinton had been extremely careless but had broken no laws by using a private email server while secretary of State, House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) urged Clapper to deny classified material to her.

Giving the Democratic nominee access, he wrote in a letter, would “send the wrong signal to all those charged with safeguarding our nations’ secrets.”

Clinton is scheduled to accept her party’s nomination tonight at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), in turn, said that U.S. intelligence analysts should “fake it” if they are ordered to brief Trump, a businessman who has never held elected office.

“If you’re forced to brief this guy, don’t tell him anything,” he told the Huffington Post. “Just fake it because this man is dangerous.”

Intelligence officials say election briefings to presidential nominees tend to be chiefly analysis of current events and leaders, and do not include highly classified details of spying sources and methods.

Clapper said this year’s heated campaign rhetoric has been “very bothersome” to U.S. allies.

“I hear that from my counterparts who take very, very seriously and study very, very closely what political figures in this country say and it is worrying to them,” he said.

“I tell them that it is part of our process in the United States and, hopefully, it will all come out right.”

A little over a month ago, Jensen Walcott and Jake A. Reed, two friends from Kansas City, Kan., were excited to find out they’d both gotten summer jobs at the same pizza restaurant.

The friends, both 17, congratulated each other, naturally, on Snapchat. But when Reed told her how much he was making, $8.25 an hour, she thought there must be some mistake — the wage she’d been offered was 25 cents less.

So she called her manager to ask. She was put on hold, and then promptly fired, she was told, because it was against company policy to discuss pay. Reed was told the same.

The hiring manager has been fired and the pizza chain has since apologized, calling it a “misunderstanding” that had nothing to do with gender discrimination. But the controversy that followed launched the two teens into the national spotlight and prompted Hillary Clinton to tweet words of encouragement.

On Thursday the pair will land on stage at the DNC.

“I don’t think anyone should be discriminated against,” Walcott told the Kansas City Star Wednesday. “Whether it’s race, or gender, or sexual orientation, or disability or anything like that.”

DNC speech writers helped them craft their address.

The teens told the newspaper they’re having the time of their lives at the convention.

“Last month I was just applying for a job,” Reed said. “We’re so baffled.”

While Walcott won’t be able to vote this November (she doesn’t turn 18 until after the election), Reed, a registered Democrat, says he plans to cast a ballot.

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Former mayor of Los Angeles Antonio Villaraigosa speaks at the Democratic National Convention about immigration. More coverage at latimes.com/trailguide.

Former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa told the thousands gathered at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia on Thursday that it was up to them to “stand up and fight” for the estimated 11 million immigrants living in the U.S. illegally.

Villaraigosa, who chaired the party’s 2012 national convention in North Carolina, focused his five-minute speech on the plight of those immigrants and the threat they face, he said, if Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump wins in November.

Trump has vowed to swiftly deport the millions of immigrants living in the U.S. without illegally.

“Donald Trump proposes the greatest mass deportation in our nation’s or any nation’s history,” Villaraigosa said on the final day of the party’s convention.

The former mayor said Trump’s immigration plan was patterned after an effort known by the outdated, racially offensive name “Operation Wetback,” an effort under President Dwight Eisenhower that led to the deportation of hundreds of thousands of people.

Villaraigosa, who is expected to make a run for California governor in 2018, said Trump’s plans would destroy families and communities. They deserve better, he said.

“They work in the hot sun. They put food on our tables even though they often have little for theirs. They build, repair and clean our homes,” Villaraigosa said. “They take care of our children when they have no one to care for their own.’’

Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, Villaraigosa said, will work to protect immigrants and fix the nation’s broken immigration system.

“We will be stronger when we elect a woman who has fought for the forgotten children; given voice to the unrepresented,” Villaraigosa said. “A woman who’s like the good shepherd and wants to bring all the flock in. Not just the white flock, but the black flock, the yellow flock, the brown flock, the Muslim flock, the Jewish flock. Every single one of us. �’

Montserrat Garibay, 36, vice president of the local teachers union in Austin, Texas

“It’s going to change the way girls see themselves. We always ask our students to be inspired and be anything that they want to be,” said Garibay, a native of Mexico City who became an American citizen after living 23 years in the U.S.

She began crying as she added, “I don’t have any children, but these past couple of months, I’ve really considered having a child so they can see the beautiful statement that we’re doing as a country. That we respect women and that they can change the world.”

The Democratic Party has included raising the minimum wage to $15 in its official party platform, following in the footsteps of Los Angeles and California, which first adopted plans to gradually raise the state minimum wage from $10 to $15. If the new minimum wage were in place today, would it be a living wage for your family? Use our calculator to find out.

(David Zalubowski / Associated Press )

Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper knows about gun violence.

It was almost four-years ago to the date when a gunman walked into a suburban Denver movie theater and opened fire, killing 12 people and wounding dozens more.

In its aftermath, Hickenlooper, faced with intense opposition from state Republicans, helped Democrats pass some of the strictest gun-control measures in the country, which include limits on ammunition magazines and universal background checks.

The move was lauded by national Democrats, including Hillary Clinton, the party’s presidential nominee. Hickenlooper, who is set to address the Democratic National Convention on Thursday, has long been a staunch ally of the former secretary of State.

This cycle he’s hosted fundraisers and applauded Clinton’s calls for stricter gun reforms in the wake of mass shootings at a Charleston, S.C., church last year and an Orlando, Fla., nightclub this summer.

Their bond has grown so much that Hickenlooper was on her short-list of potential vice presidential picks -- a key ally from a critical Western swing state.

Should Clinton win the election, many political observers believe Hickelooper will be offered a cabinet position.

Will he accept a job - perhaps Interior Secretary?

“I don’t know. It would all depend on, you know, what exactly she wanted to have done and what her vision was,” he recently told the Denver Post.

Labor icon Dolores Huerta, co-founder of the United Farm Workers union, spoke on the final day of the Democratic National Convention.

Huerta endorsed presidential nominee Hillary Clinton in her first presidential campaign in 2008 and again this year.

She spoke about Clinton’s work as an advocate for children, families, workers and immigrant rights.

“They will drive us on that journey for justice and equality,” Huerta said of Clinton and her vice presidential running mate, Tim Kaine.

Huerta’s son Emilio Huerta is set to face California Rep. David Valadao (R-Hanford) in November. Democrats have a 16-percentage-point advantage over Republicans in the Central Valley’s 21st Congressional District, but Valadao has trounced his last two opponents.

Democrats hope Huerta’s name recognition and Donald Trump’s negatives can flip the district.

For his part, Valadao has said that he can’t support Trump.

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Civil rights activist Dolores Huerta speaks at the Democratic National Convention. More coverage at latimes.com/trailguide.

At the Democratic National Convention, vice presidential nominee Tim Kaine said the country needs to “advance opportunity for everybody” and former L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa on Thursday made inclusiveness a central theme of his speech. Many speakers have expressed similar approaches to immigration policy as a contrast to Donald Trump’s hard-line “build a wall” rhetoric.

About 11.3 million people are in the U.S. illegally, according to a study from the Pew Research Center. They account for about 5.1% of the labor force in the country and more than half of them live in only six states.

Here is a look at how some states have shaped their immigrant policies:

Healthcare and welfare benefits

People who are in the U.S. illegally cannot apply for government subsidized insurance from the Affordable Care Act. However, many states provide health insurance for children and/or full Medicaid benefits to pregnant women regardless of their status.

While some states offer welfare benefits based only on the number of citizens and permanent residents in a household, others extend benefits to citizens’ family members who are in the country illegally if they’re living in the same household.

Higher education

Children and young adults in this country illegally get protection against deportation and the possibility to work if they meet certain requirements. Twenty states let them access education with in-state tuition and provide them with scholarships or other forms of financial aid.

Driving laws

Twelve states and the District of Columbia have enacted laws to allow immigrants in this country illegally to obtain driver’s licenses.

Only two states, Washington and New Mexico, issue the same driver’s license to every person regardless of their immigration status. The other states issue distinctive licenses.

Hillary Clinton and Democrats are using Donald Trump’s own words against him throughout this week’s convention.

At various junctures throughout the convention, short video clips that highlight Trump’s words on, among other issues, women, national security and veterans are being highlighted.

Check out what’s been said this week.

Read More

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LGBT rights activist Sarah McBride, the first openly transgender person to address a major party convention, speaks at the Democratic National Convention. More coverage at latimes.com/trailguide.

Activist Sarah McBride is set to make history Thursday at the Democratic National Convention when she becomes the first openly transgender person to speak at a major party convention.

McBride made headlines in 2012 when she came out as a transgender woman while serving as student president at American University.

Now McBride is the national press secretary for the Human Rights Campaign, a gay and lesbian rights organization.

“I’m honored for this opportunity to share my story and to be the first transgender person to speak at a major party convention,” McBride said in a statement this week.

Will we hear the “Rocky” theme music? Will Hillary Clinton wear blue? Will someone mention cheesesteaks? What does Pokemon have to do with politics anyway?

We’ll find out tonight. Play along!

After a day that demonstrated weaknesses in both presidential candidates, a series of high-powered surrogates for Hillary Clinton impugned Donald Trump from the Democratic convention stage Wednesday, aiming at the voters she will need for victory in November.

President Obama leaned toward a young generation that helped secure his two terms. Vice President Joe Biden appealed to blue-collar Americans. Former New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg implored independents. Clinton’s running mate, Tim Kaine, reached out to Republicans who feel abandoned by their party.

It is a strategy that the Clinton campaign will have to employ for months if she is to win in November.

Clinton enters the general election sprint as a woefully unpopular politician. One of the best things she has going for her is that her opponent, Republican nominee Trump, is in precisely the same position — but with far less in the way of backup.

Transferring popularity is a difficult, sometimes impossible, task, though in Clinton’s case it can’t hurt that Obama’s standing has rebounded significantly as the contest to replace him has heated up. And Biden, now in the final months of a four-decade-plus political career, has always been popular among the working-class Americans with whom he grew up.

They and the others played on their connections to Clinton’s benefit Wednesday.

Read More

When Barbara Mikulski was first elected to the U.S. Senate in 1986, she was the only woman in that chamber, and the first one to be elected to her seat in her own right, without being appointed or filling the seat of a dead husband.

Today, Mikulski, 80, is the longest-serving woman in the history of Congress and one of 20 women in the Senate, 14 of whom are Democrats.

On the final night of the Democratic convention, Mikulski will be standing with them as she speaks on behalf of Hillary Clinton.

Earlier this week, Mikulski delivered the official nominating speech for Clinton, saying the former secretary of State would “fight for the macro issues and the macaroni and cheese issues.”

Mikulski is the senior Democrat on the powerful Senate Appropriations Committee and also was the first woman to chair the committee.

Often described as “tough as nails,” she has been a fierce advocate for women’s health issues and equal pay, and was a central player in ensuring that coverage for women’s contraceptives and mammograms was included in the Affordable Care Act. She also was the deciding vote on the Iran nuclear deal.

In 2014, when Republicans filibustered to block equal pay legislation, Mikulski said she was teary-eyed to hear stories of women paid less than their male counterparts.

“When I hear all these phony reasons — some are mean and some are meaningless — I get angry. I get outraged. I get volcanic,” she told The Times.

Mikulski was first elected to the House in 1977, and moved over to the Senate in 1987. She and Clinton served together in the Senate from 2001-09.

Communications released in the trove of State Department emails from Hillary Clinton’s account also revealed a close friendship between the two. In one email, Mikulski spoke about a recent party, where she said Clinton had looked so “fit n sparkly.”

She announced last year that she would not seek another term and would retire at the end of 2016.

Henrietta Ivey is a home healthcare worker, caring mostly for seniors in her hometown of Detroit.

But at $8.50 an hour, Michigan’s minimum wage, Ivey also has to work another 25 to 30 hours a week as a driver for an auto parts supplier, she told the Detroit News.

“I almost lost my house a few months ago,” she told the newspaper.

Ivey has two children and three grandchildren who she supports on her wages, she said. In 2014, she joined the “Fight for $15” campaign advocating for a $15 minimum wage nationwide.

The current federal minimum wage of $7.25 has not been raised since 2009.

Fast-food employees, home-care workers and other low-wage laborers have marched in cities across the United States, including in Los Angeles.

The effort has been central to the fights in California and New York, which earlier this year became the first two states to sign a $15 minimum wage into law.

Figuring out how to get low-income voters like Ivey to the polls is one of the biggest challenges facing Democrats this fall.

GOP vice presidential nominee Mike Pence on Thursday predicted Roe vs. Wade, the landmark Supreme Court ruling that legalized abortion, would be overturned if Donald Trump is elected president.

“I’m pro-life and I don’t apologize for it,” he said during a town hall meeting here. “We’ll see Roe vs. Wade consigned to the ash heap of history where it belongs.”

The comments — made in a conservative stronghold that strongly supported Texas Sen. Ted Cruz over Trump in the Michigan primary — were part of a broader argument Pence has been making on the stakes of the election: Voters need to consider that the next president will likely select multiple Supreme Court justices.

Pence said Trump would appoint strict constitutionalists in the mold of the late Justice Antonin Scalia.

“While we’re choosing a president for the next four years, this next president will make decisions that will impact our Supreme Court for the next 40,” he said. “… Go tell your neighbors and your friends, for the sake of the rule of law, for the sake of sanctity of life, for the sake of our 2nd Amendment, for the sake of all our other God-given liberties, we must insure the next president appointing justices to the Supreme Court is Donald Trump.”

For ambitious young Democrats from Barack Obama to Julian Castro, the Democratic National Convention has served as a stage to introduce themselves to a national audience. Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti will likewise be seeking to capture the political spotlight when he makes his debut address to the convention Thursday evening in Philadelphia.

Garcetti, 45, has been consigned to a relatively unglamorous speaking slot. He is scheduled to speak at the convention at 4 p.m. PT (though that’s subject to change), well before most viewers (even on the East Coast) begin tuning in for the convention’s prime-time lineup. But he does have the advantage of appearing on the same day that Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton is delivering the week’s most anticipated speech.

In an email sent to supporters of his 2017 reelection effort Thursday, Garcetti said he would “share the story of Los Angeles as a model for the country,” a theme he echoed in an interview with The Times.

“If we can do it in L.A., I want to say, we can do it across this country,” Garcetti said. “In many ways, the West Coast is leading, and hopefully inspiring, the nation to do the same.”

Like California as a whole, L.A. has seen a steady drop in unemployment over the last several years. Famous for choking traffic congestion, the city is also in the midst of a historic expansion of its public transportation infrastructure. Garcetti and other elected officials are campaigning for a tax measure that would continue to fund the buildout of the city’s rail and bus system begun under former Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.

Yet in other areas, L.A. is struggling, and sometimes losing ground, against intractable urban problems. Just last week — as Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump was warning at his party’s convention of rising violence on America’s streets — the Los Angeles Police Department announced overall crime was up for the second straight year after decades of decline.

The city’s homeless population also has increased since Garcetti took office in 2013, and it now stands at more than 26,000. That figure includes the nation’s largest population of homeless people who sleep on the streets without access to even temporary shelter.

Garcetti, a Rhodes scholar of mixed Jewish, Mexican and Italian ancestry who speaks fluent Spanish, is also likely to draw attention to his administration’s signature legislative achievement: L.A.’s passage of a law last May that will gradually raise the citywide minimum wage to $15 an hour.

The $15 minimum wage — which also has been passed by California and New York states, as well as a number of other large cities across the country — has become a rallying cry for Democrats and was incorporated this year into the party’s platform.

Times staff writer Sarah D. Wire contributed to this report.

House Democratic Caucus Chairman Xavier Becerra is expected to speak shortly before Hillary Clinton officially accepts the Democratic Party’s nomination for president, a prime speaking slot for a surrogate who has appeared on Clinton’s behalf for months.

Only Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and Clinton’s daughter, Chelsea, speak between Becerra and the Democratic presidential nominee.

Becerra said in an interview Thursday he’s going to talk about electing “someone who walks with me, someone who walks with us,” but he couldn’t go into many details.

“This is a very personal election in so many ways. The outcome of this election will affect me, it will affect my parents, it will affect my constituents,” he said.

Becerra’s name was floated for months as a possible vice presidential candidate. He made stops around the country to stump for the former secretary of State but he wasn’t vetted by the Clinton campaign and has been mum about the future.

As for Clinton’s speech, Becerra said he expects she will “give the people a sense of who she is and I don’t mean her résumé. People don’t see the Hillary Clinton that so many of us have gotten to know.”

One of the most prominent Latinos in Congress, Becerra is running for a 13th term in his Los Angeles district. But his opportunities to move up in the House leadership are limited unless someone retires or steps down. His term as caucus chairman is up soon.

Last year, he contemplated running for retiring Sen. Barbara Boxer’s seat, but decided to stay in the House despite an uncertain path to power there.

As Democrats celebrate picking Hillary Clinton as their first female presidential nominee, Rep. Barbara Lee of Oakland is reflecting about the first woman who tried, her mentor, Shirley Chisholm.

“She paved the way, not just for Hillary Clinton, but for Barack Obama,” Lee said. “It’s a remarkable moment and a humbling moment.”

Chisholm, the first African American woman to serve in Congress, was also the first woman and the first African American to run for president in the Democratic Party.

Lee began working for Chisholm’s campaign after inviting her to speak to the Black Student Union at Mills College. Lee had been working with the Black Panther Party and wasn’t registered to vote when she asked Chisholm if she could volunteer.

Chisholm told Lee that women and people of color didn’t write the rules and they had to get involved in order to change them. She said Lee could volunteer, but she’d have to register to vote.

“She took me to task,” Lee said in an interview. “She told me if I was for real, I had better get involved.”

On a shoestring campaign budget, Chisholm made it to the 1972 convention.

“We were excited and energized and hopeful,” Lee said. “The big deal was how long she was going to stay in.”

At one point, Chisholm had her delegates and staff pile into a hotel room to deliberate.

“That was really very profound and very intimate for all of us,” Lee said. “I got to see her personal side really close up. She knew she was on the right side on history.”

U.S. Sen. George McGovern won the nomination and went on to lose the election to President Richard Nixon.

After the convention, Chisholm returned to Congress, and when Lee came to Capitol Hill to work for Rep. Ron Dellums, Chisholm acted as a mentor, telling Lee she’d be in Congress one day.

“She knew that I really revered her and looked up to her,” Lee said. “She was very kind to me.”

Chisholm called Lee “Little Girl” until she died in 2005.

Lee said she didn’t expect more than four decades to pass before the party nominated a woman.

“I’m not happy it took this long because we should be able to elect women, people of color, whoever, because of who they are,” Lee said. “It’s like, why not?”

Former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, a longtime political ally of Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, is expected to come gunning for her opponent when he returns to the main stage at the Democratic National Convention on Thursday.

In June, Villaraigosa launched a national political action committee — Building Bridges, Not Walls — to counter what he called Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s “scapegoating anti-immigrant politics.’’ The PAC is targeting immigrant voters in swing states, encouraging them to go to the polls in November.

Villaraigosa presided as chairman of the party’s 2012 convention in Charlotte, N.C., which ushered President Obama to reelection.

Villaraigosa’s brief return to the national spotlight comes as a warmup to an expected 2018 bid for California governor, a race that may get crowded over the next year. Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom — who took the stage at the convention Wednesday — and state Treasurer John Chiang, both Democrats, also have launched campaigns to replace Gov. Jerry Brown when he leaves office in two years.

Villaraigosa said he won’t announce his intentions until after the November election, saying he wanted to focus instead on helping Clinton win the White House.

He served as mayor of Los Angeles from 2005 to 2013, and a two-year term as speaker of the state Assembly in the late 1990s.

He flirted with a run for U.S. Senate in early 2015 when four-term Democrat Barbara Boxer announced her retirement, but opted not to jump into the race.

At a Facebook Live event Tuesday morning, Glamour editor-in-chief Cindi Leive asked Chelsea Clinton about Ivanka Trump’s Republican National Convention speech, when she told the crowd that her father, GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump, believes in “equal pay for equal work.”

“Given it’s not something that [the candidate] has spoken about,” Clinton responded, “there are no policies on any of those fronts that you just mentioned on his website — not last week, not this week. So I think the �How?’ question is super important. In politics as it is in life.”

Before Hillary Clinton and Trump faced off in a presidential race, their daughters maintained a longtime friendship. As The Times’ Evan Halper reported last year, Chelsea Clinton had a front-row seat at Ivanka Trump’s wedding in 2005.

Former first daughter Clinton will parallel Trump’s daughter tonight when she introduces her mother at the Democratic National Convention.

As of Wednesday night, our USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times “Daybreak” tracking poll of the presidential race shows Donald Trump holding steady with a seven-point lead over Hillary Clinton.

That represents a significant convention bounce for Trump -- not a record, as Trump recently claimed, but one larger than the average for recent candidates. The question now is whether that increase will prove lasting, or will it be wiped away by a bounce for Clinton from the Democratic convention?

We can’t answer that yet, of course, but there are a few things we do know.

Read More

Ryan Hampton, 35, stood before his fellow California delegates at their morning breakfast Thursday to introduce himself.

“I have not used drugs or alcohol in 18 months, and I have to tell you, a year and a half ago I didn’t know if I was going to live or die,” Hampton said. “Here I am today, not only a person recovering from heroin, but a delegate to the Democratic National Convention, and I think that shows that we are everywhere.”

Opioid addiction and recovery is being highlighted more frequently in the presidential campaign: On Monday, the Democratic Party dedicated about an hour to the topic. And on Tuesday, Hampton spoke on a panel with House and Senate members working to get more funding for a massive bill to expand addiction treatment programs that President Obama recently signed into law.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, opioids — primarily prescription pain relievers and heroin — were involved in 28,647 deaths in 2014, or about 78 people a day.

Hampton said he decided to become a delegate because the recovery community in Pasadena wanted to focus more attention on the scope of the problem. Hampton’s fellow recovering addicts campaigned for him and scraped together the money to get him to Philadelphia.

Hampton left his home at Angel’s Way Sober Living in Pasadena two weeks ago and drove the 2,500 miles to Philadelphia in an RV.

Along the way, Hampton stopped at recovery centers and prisons to interview other addicts and their families about life with addiction and how access to treatment is different depending on where you live. His documentary is available in parts online at the Huffington Post.

“People in recovery are everywhere. We are your brothers, and we are your fathers and mothers and sons. We are your CEOs of major corporations, we your employees, your neighbors. We are in your living rooms and we are in your backyards,” Hampton said. “It became apparent to me that how can we ever affect change if America doesn’t know us?”

While he was on his way to Philadelphia, Hampton got a call from the White House asking if he could stop in to the West Wing to talk with the president’s domestic policy advisors, so of course he did. They told him they think more people who are recovering from addiction should speak out.

“Once people identify what the issue is and that it is in their backyard, then they will be able to understand and treat this epidemic with compassion and we can get to a solution,” he said.

Hampton said in an interview that he’s grateful Clinton has made opioid addiction treatment programs part of her platform, but he plans to hold her to it.

“I’m a Hillary delegate, I love her to death, but when she is president, I am going to hold her accountable on behalf of my community for this issue. I expect action from the party when they win in November.”

Hampton said he has added an extra week’s worth of stops on the drive back home.

“People are listening, I think the DNC is listening, I think the White House is listening, I think Donald Trump is listening. I just hope that change is made,” he said.

(Zbigniew Bzdak / Chicago Tribune)

U.S. Rep. Tammy Duckworth didn’t speak long at the Illinois Democratic delegation breakfast Wednesday, but she didn’t have to. The standing ovation and the chanting of her name were preordained.

She tossed out a few jokes about Sen. Mark Steven Kirk, the Republican she hopes to dethrone this fall. She retold stories about growing up poor. And she alluded to her war-hero status in a gracious way, praising her fellow Democrats for participating in the democratic process, which she allowed was “probably just as patriotic as serving in the military.”

Moments later, Duckworth and a campaign staffer decamped to an out-of-the-way corner in the hotel lobby to get to work on what’s expected to be a prime-time speech Thursday on the Democratic National Convention stage.

That the two-term congresswoman from Hoffman Estates still hadn’t locked in her remarks on the eve of her moment in the national spotlight is a sign of the power of her personal story. An Iraq War veteran and the first Asian American woman elected to Congress from Illinois, Duckworth isn’t lacking for material that will play well with the convention crowd.

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A Washington Post reporter was patted down, questioned and denied entrance into a rally for GOP vice presidential nominee Mike Pence late Wednesday, widening a ban on the newspaper by Donald Trump’s campaign.

Since being banned last month, Post reporters have attended rallies as members of the public rather than entering an area set aside for media. On Wednesday, the reporter was told by a private security officer that he couldn’t enter with a cellphone, as other attendees did, because he worked for the Post, the paper reported.

“Law enforcement officers, in collusion with private security officials, subjected a reporter to bullying treatment that no ordinary citizen has to endure,” Post Executive Editor Martin Baron said. “All of this took place in a public facility no less. The harassment of an independent press isn’t coming to an end. It’s getting worse.”

Pence aides said that event volunteers overstepped their bounds and that his rallies are open to anyone.

Chelsea Clinton said Thursday that Donald Trump describes a country in which she can’t imagine raising her children.

“That actually I found far more upsetting … than anything they said about my mom,” Clinton said in an interview with NBC’s “Today” that aired Thursday.

Republicans’ attacks on Hillary Clinton pale in comparison to Trump’s insults of women, minorities, Muslims and immigrants, Chelsea Clinton said. She said that she doesn’t worry about the attacks on her mother because years in politics taught Hillary Clinton how to respond.

“She’s tough and she can take whatever people say about her,” Chelsea Clinton said.

The women in Congress who’ve known her the longest say Hillary Clinton’s acceptance of the presidential nomination Thursday night is a recognition of their work together.

The idea that the United States might elect a woman president for the first time hasn’t been omnipresent on the campaign trail. But it’s been there all along for the women in California’s delegation.

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Seven members of California’s congressional delegation spoke at the Democratic National Convention Wednesday. Here’s some of what they said:

Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Burbank)

Schiff, who is ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said Trump’s vision of foreign affairs is “not leadership, this is calamity.”

Schiff has spent more than a decade building his expertise in foreign affairs. Schiff was also one of the top Democrats on the House committee investigating the 2012 attack on Americans in Benghazi.

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Rep. Adam Schiff of California speaks at the Democratic National Convention

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles)

Waters represents the South Los Angeles neighborhoods of Inglewood, Hawthorne and Gardena and is the highest-ranking Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee.

She was an early backer of Hillary Clinton’s. During her speech Wednesday, Waters mentioned the Black Lives Matter movement by name and said Clinton would “work to support our police” and “also support fair police policies.”

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Rep. Maxine Waters of California speaks at the Democratic National Convention

Rep. Judy Chu (D-Monterey Park)

Chu represents the San Gabriel Valley in Los Angeles County and is the first Chinese-American woman elected to Congress.

She introduced the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, saying of Asian American voters: “We have gone from being marginalized to becoming the margin of victory in key swing states and districts all across our nation.”

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Rep. Judy Chu of California speaks at the Democratic National Convention

Rep. Mark Takano (D-Riverside)

Takano is the first openly gay Asian American elected to the U.S. Congress.

He called himself a “proud gaysian” and said he supports Clinton because “she is a strong champion for LGBT rights.”

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Rep. Mark Takano of California speaks at the Democratic National Convention

Rep. Ami Bera (D-Elk Grove)

Bera, the only South Asian member of Congress, is facing a tough reelection battle in a competitive Sacramento County district. His opponent is Republican Sacramento County Sheriff Scott Jones.

A member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Bera says he backs Clinton because she “understands the complexity of the world and is prepared from day one to lead.”

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Rep. Ami Bera of California speaks at the Democratic National Convention

Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Torrance)

Lieu represents L.A.’s South Bay and portions of west Los Angeles and the beach cities. Lieu, a colonel in the U.S. Air Force Reserve, said he supports Clinton because “she’ll fight for our military personnel.”

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Rep. Ted Lieu of California speaks at the Democratic National Convention.

Rep. Karen Bass (D-Los Angeles)

Bass, who previously served as speaker of the California State Assembly, was the first black woman to serve in that post.

She decried the “incoherent rage” she said Trump has come to embody and implored voters to “ensure our nation will not slide backwards to the bigotry of our past.”

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Rep. Karen Bass of California speaks at the Democratic National Convention