Joe Biden said Monday he was ready to pass the torch to new Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris, as he prepared to give a bittersweet farewell address to the party's convention in Chicago. Protests against Israel's war in Gaza had threatened to overshadow the US president's big day, but only a few thousand demonstrators turned out instead of the tens of thousands that organizers had predicted. The speech will nevertheless be one of the most difficult moments in the 81-year-old's long career, as he faces the party that pushed him out of the White House race less than a month ago after a disastrous debate with Donald Trump.
But while he finds himself consigned to being the convention's warm-up act instead of its star, Biden is also expected to receive a hero's welcome as Democrats thank him for stepping aside for Harris. America's first female, Black and South Asian vice president has turned the presidential race upside down, breathing new life into the Democratic Party and wiping out Trump's lead in the polls. "I am," Biden told reporters when asked if he was ready to pass the torch to Harris, as he did a sound check at the convention center.
Harris is expected to appear briefly on stage with Biden and give her own hugely anticipated speech at the culmination of the convention on Thursday. Trump meanwhile tried to drag the attention back to himself with a rally in the battleground state of Pennsylvania in which he highlighted what he called Harris's "craziness" and s.