Harris Dives Into a Frenetic Final Week With a Swing Through Michigan

 Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris urged supporters to cast their ballots early during a rally near the University of Michigan campus Monday evening, a week out from the Nov. 5 election and as more than 1.77 million votes have already been cast early in the crucial battleground state.

"We need you to vote early Michigan, because we have just eight days to go, eight days left in one of the most consequential elections of our lifetime," Harris said from the stage in Burns Park. "And, as everybody here knows, this is going to be a tight race to the very end."

Harris urged supporters not just to vote themselves, but to ensure friends and family make it to the polls, warning of what a second Trump presidency would mean in terms of reproductive rights for the student-heavy crowd.

This is not 2016 or 2020," Harris said. "We can all see that Donald Trump is even more unstable and more unhinged. And now he wants unchecked power. And this time there will be no one there to stop him.”

Lines to get into Burns Park where the rally was held wrapped through leaf-covered Ann Arbor neighborhoods ahead of the event, which was Harris' third campaign stop of the day in Michigan.

Democrats are hoping to run up the score on college campuses, where students tend to lean left. The state Legislature in June gave roughly $1 million each to clerks in Ann Arbor and East Lansing to set up Election Day Voting Centers, reserved for students who have to register and vote on Election Day.

The locations will help to relieve clerks' offices near the college campuses, who have in recent election cycles have juggled long lines on Election Day for students seeking to register and vote on the same day. Through Sunday, about 1.5 million Michigan voters had already returned absentee ballots to their local clerks, while another 263,634 had cast ballots at early voting centers across the state. Early, in-person voting continues through Nov. 3.