Vice President Kamala Harris on Wednesday made her most direct and expansive pitch yet to conservative and moderate voters, appearing in Pennsylvania with a phalanx of Republican elected officials who have set aside their party loyalties to try to defeat former President Donald J. Trump.
At a campaign event in Bucks County, Pa., Ms. Harris tried to strike a unifying tone even as she castigated her opponent, casting her campaign as one that embraced anyone who believed that Mr. Trump should not serve a second term.
“Our campaign is not a fight against something — it is a fight for something,” she said. “It’s a fight for the fundamental principles upon which we were founded. It is a fight for a new generation of leadership that is optimistic about what we can achieve together — Republicans, Democrats and independents who want to move past the politics of division and blame and get things done on behalf of the American people.”
The appearance was Ms. Harris’s 11th to the battleground state since she took over the Democratic ticket, and took place in one of its most competitive suburban areas, Bucks County, which President Biden won narrowly in 2020 but where Republicans this year gained an advantage in voter registration.
Ms. Harris, who also spoke to a large Republican audience on Wednesday evening during an interview on Fox News, gave her remarks against the backdrop of a small barn lined with American flags, near where George Washington crossed the icy Delaware River during the Revolutionary War.
The event loosely resembled the one Ms. Harris held this month with former Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming, the most prominent Republican to endorse her, in Ripon, Wis., near where the Republican Party was formed.
The gathering in Washington Crossing, Pa., featured distinctly patriotic notes not found at other campaign events, including a large, red banner reading “Country over party,” the presenting of the colors and the Pledge of Allegiance. At one point before Ms. Harris took the stage, the crowd broke out in a “U.S.A.!” chant. More than 100 Republicans attended, including registered voters and former elected G.O.P. officials.
“Now, in a typical election, you all being here with me would be surprising,” Ms. Harris said, as she and the crowd chuckled. “But not in this election. Because at stake in this race are the democratic ideals that our founders, and generations of Americans, have fought for. At stake in this election is the Constitution itself.”
Ms. Harris laid out a broad, historically based argument about the sanctity of democracy, talking about how not long after the United States achieved independence, delegates from across the nation gathered in nearby Philadelphia to write and sign the Constitution.
Early this year, Mr. Biden also used an appearance in suburban Philadelphia to condemn Mr. Trump in a blistering speech attacking him for trying to overturn the 2020 election.
Ms. Harris, who has ratcheted up her attacks on Mr. Trump as a would-be authoritarian, made an implicit reference to his recent comments about deploying the military against Americans who might protest his election, and describing his detractors as the “enemy from within.”
“We here know the Constitution is not a relic of our past, but determines whether we are a country where the people can speak freely and even criticize the president without fear of being thrown in jail or targeted by the military,” Ms. Harris said.
As she recited how Mr. Trump tried to overturn the 2020 election, she went out of her way to praise former Vice President Mike Pence, who has declined to endorse his former boss, for his “courage and patriotism” in preventing Mr. Trump from “overturning the will of the American people.”
The Republican leaders who joined Ms. Harris included former Representative Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, who was cast out by his party after serving on the House committee that investigated Mr. Trump’s role in inciting the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021.
“Donald Trump may be running as a Republican, but the truth is, he does not share those long-held Republican values of supporting democracy, of standing for the rule of law and of faithfulness to the Constitution,” Mr. Kinzinger said during his brief remarks. “As a Republican, that saddens me. But what gives me hope is that there is a candidate in this race who does hold those values.”
Mr. Kinzinger was not above personal insults, though, calling Mr. Trump a “whiny, weak, small, tiny man who is scared to death.”
Ms. Harris was introduced by a Pennsylvania couple, Bob and Kristina Lange, two lifelong Republicans and local farmers who previously voted for Mr. Trump. They have appeared in recent advertisements for Ms. Harris meant to showcase her bipartisan support.
Mr. Lange said that “Jan. 6 was the straw that broke the camel’s back” for him and condemned Mr. Trump’s “enemy from within” remarks.
“That is dangerous language,” he said. “We know that a second Trump term would be much worse than his first, and we deserve better.”
His wife, Kristina, echoed his sentiments, saying that Republicans needed someone who would defend the Constitution. “Never in a million years did either of us think we’d be standing here supporting a Democrat,” she said. “But we’ve had enough. We’ve had enough.”
Ms. Harris reiterated other promises she has made as she seeks to win over moderate and conservative voters, including that she would appoint a Republican to her cabinet and form a bipartisan council of advisers. She emphasized that she valued a healthy two-party system in which the two sides debate the merits of policy and work across the aisle to get things done.
She concluded that above all else, her administration would not “trample” on democratic ideals as she said Mr. Trump had done.
“If you share that view, no matter your party, no matter who you voted for last time, there is a place for you in this campaign,” Ms. Harris said.
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