Denver Riggleman says Kamala Harris could help reset Republican politics (2024)

On a humid Wednesday afternoon at an Afton distillery, a Republican from a blue state and a Democrat from a red state explained to a crowd of 60 people why they will be voting for Vice President Kamala Harris this November, and why they hope conservatives and moderates will join them.

Former Rep. Denver Riggleman, a Republican, and former New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu, a Democrat, argued that the best thing for the Republican Party would be for its presidential nominee to lose.

“If you want to have a party going into the future, in a very strange way, you have to vote for Kamala Harris,” said Landrieu, who serves at co-chair of the Harris campaign.

He and Riggleman spoke to the crowd as part of a push by Republicans for Harris, an organization trying to sway Republicans and independents to walk away from former President Donald Trump. At the heart of their case is a belief that the upcoming election presents an opportunity for a Republican renaissance: A Harris victory, they say, will purge the party of Trump and allow it to be reborn, released from the tight grip of the “Make America Great Again” movement.

“I’m here today because I think there has to be two viable parties. I think we only have one right now, and I don’t think that’s the Republican side,” Riggleman said. “I don’t know if they’re actually Republicans, but they’re more like Trump believers and almost a cult-like behavior that we’re seeing with people that no matter what he does, they still seem to support him.”

In 2018, Riggleman was elected to represent Virginia’s 5th Congressional District. But he only lasted one term. In 2020, he lost the Republican nomination to Rep. Bob Good in a convention contest after he faced pushback for officiating a wedding between two men who were friends and volunteers for his campaign.

Riggleman has made a name for himself as a “Never Trumper,” speaking out on the House floor against the conspiracy theories pushed by the Trump-supporting QAnon group and serving as a senior staffer to a House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attempt to overturn the presidential election in Trump’s favor.

Good himself lost the GOP primary this past June to state Sen. John McGuire in a race where Trump played a pivotal role. During the campaign, Good was repeatedly attacked from the right for disloyalty to Trump and endorsing Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis over Trump in the presidential primary.

On Wednesday, Riggleman and Landrieu tried to make a case that Trump’s rhetoric and policy positions do not represent true Republican values. Voters, they pleaded, need to give the pre-MAGA Republican Party a chance to regroup.

It was not their first time speaking out against Trump. Even so, Riggleman said that publicly advocating for people to turn away from Trump is a daunting endeavor.

“It’s a little bit scary. I’m not going to lie,” Riggleman said. “You can be a little bit afraid, but you’re allowed to stretch. You’re allowed to do what’s OK for your country. And if you’re like, ‘I’m going to vote for Harris, but I’m not going to tell anybody,’ I’m fine with that.”

The event was held in a pavilion at Silverback Distillery in Afton, which Riggleman owns with his wife. He and Landrieu each had a glass of bourbon at a small table between them. Republicans for Harris signage was plastered around them, including one that read, “Party over country.” Riggleman referenced the sign as the thick August air slowly melted the single ice cube in his glass.

The sign was fitting, he said, but he suggested different wording may be more accurate: “Sanity over party.”

“It’s actually reality, a pro-reality army that’s going to come out and beat some of these insane things,” Riggleman said.

The former Virginia congressman did not mince words. He does not have to be kind, he said. And after what he saw during his time working with the Jan. 6 committee, much of it confidential, he genuinely believes that Trump presents an existential threat to democracy. Landrieu believes the same.

That’s the message they hope will sway voters.

“Help us save democracy,” Landrieu told The Daily Progress. “If Democracy goes away, Republicans and Democrats alike who are commonsense, thinking people will not have a future that is a happy time for anybody in the country.”

It’s a line that’s unlikely to convince the Trump faithful, who reject the notion that the Republican nominee poses any threat. But there is some evidence it could reach other voters.

In 2022, many Trump-endorsed candidates, particularly those that perpetuated the conspiracy theory that the 2020 election was rigged, lost handedly in midterm races across the country.

“There might be some small sliver of voters that are receptive to that,” Kyle Kondik of the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics told The Daily Progress. “What percentage of people is that, and how many of them are open to this message? I wouldn’t necessarily put a number on it.”

It’s a figure that would be hard to gauge.

Prior to President Joe Biden withdrawing from the race, roughly 15% of Americans were considered “double-haters,” that is, voters who disliked both Biden and Trump and did not want to see a rematch between the two candidates. But that number has decreased since Harris became the Democrats’ presumptive nominee.

“Those sorts of voters are still out there who are suspicious of both major party candidates,” Kondik said.

While Democrats are still riding a high from Harris entering the race, and while her favorability rating has significantly increased since that decision, the election is still likely to be a tight race. It’s still too early to tell what effect selecting Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate or conspiracy theorist-turned-independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. making it onto ballots will have on the race.

“I do want you to know that notwithstanding how exciting the last 15 days have been, and any politician in here that’s looked at this has been like, ‘I’ve never seen anything like it,’ I want to assure you that this is going to be a very, very, very close race,” Landrieu said.

The excitement has brought the race back to even, he said, but not secured any victory.

Harris has racked up an impressive list of Republican endorsem*nts from right-of-center politicians who don’t want to see Trump return to the White House. That list includes former Trump White House officials Stephanie Grisham and Olivia Troye, more than a dozen former GOP members of Congress, former Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel, former Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood, former Georgia Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan and former Republican Govs. Jim Edgar of Illinois, Bill Weld of Massachusetts and Christine Todd Whitman of New Jersey.

And while there may not be a large number of persuadable voters, considering how close the election is expected to be, Riggleman and other Republicans voting for Harris may not need to convince that many people.

Near the start of Wednesday’s gathering, Riggleman took an informal poll. He found that most of the people in the crowd were Democrats. But roughly a dozen said they were Republicans, and others identified as independents. He estimated the latter groups made up 40% of the crowd.

“If that’s the ratio going into this election, Kamala Harris wins. We know that, right? Kamala Harris wins, and that’s why you’re here,” Riggleman said.

Nelson County residents Stu and Kathy Armstrong both identify as independents. Kathy Armstrong said she was a Republican until 2016.

“I like the idea of a bipartisan event with both Republicans and Democrats attending. That’s what we need,” she told The Daily Progress.

Both she and her husband want to see politicians that are willing to compromise. Stu Armstrong thinks Riggleman embodies “getting to yes,” an ability to work with others and get things done.

“I wish he’d run again,” Stu Armstrong told The Daily Progress, with his wife in agreement.

Riggleman, he said, has “the commonsensical approach to getting to yes. And that’s what I think Harris and Tim Walz are going to do. ... It’s very exciting.”