CHICAGO — The Democratic National Convention, which opens Monday in Chicago, will be a test for the party and its new standard-bearer, Vice President Kamala Harris, who has never been so center stage. The next few days should signal how Harris intends to define her candidacy, and will help determine whether the party can remain unified despite deep divisions over issues including the war in the Gaza Strip.

Here are six things to watch for this week.

Harris Presents Herself

Harris’ acceptance speech Thursday offers her a chance to introduce herself to what will likely be, along with her debate or debates with former President Donald Trump, one of the biggest audiences she will have before Election Day. Her challenge, Democrats say, is to balance loyalty to President Joe Biden and assuming control of her party.

Her speech is an opportunity to show the extent to which she intends to carve out her own political identity and demonstrate how a Harris presidency would be different from a Biden presidency. Not incidentally, it is also a test of whether the sitting vice president will present herself as the candidate of change or as the incumbent, running on the record of the past three years.

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Party Unity

Democrats are hoping for four days of party-building, well aware of the dissension-free convention staged by Trump and the Republican Party last month in Milwaukee. That might be tough.

The convention will be shadowed by demonstrations over the Biden administration’s strong support of Israel in the war in Gaza, a policy opposed by a sizable contingent of Democratic delegates. Protests on the streets could spill into the convention hall. Should that happen, Paul Begala, a Democratic consultant, said Harris would need to separate herself from “the fringe of her coalition.” He added: “This is important in terms of defining her as both strong and mainstream.”

A Handoff From a Clinton

Hillary Clinton is set to speak Monday night, and thoughts about what might have been will not be lost on anyone in the hall. In 2016, Trump defeated her in her bid to be the first female president, a loss that some Democrats argued was at least in part a sign of Americans’ unwillingness to elect a woman to the nation’s highest office.

Now it is Harris who is seeking to break that barrier, and Clinton will be seen as handing her the baton.

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Biden’s Appearance

The last sitting president who decided not to seek a second term, Lyndon B. Johnson, skipped his party’s convention in 1968, which was also in Chicago. By contrast, Biden will be speaking Monday night in what could be one of his last big moments on the national stage.

It will be an opportunity for the party to honor Biden and provides him a chance at an early farewell address: to recite accomplishments of his term, make the case for his successor and frame the election as he would have had he remained in the race.

The Next Generation

Democrats have a strong bench of candidates who spent the year mostly wandering the wilderness, unwilling to challenge Biden in the primary. Some were positioning themselves to run in 2028 or to jump into the race should Biden bow out. But the speed with which the party coalesced around Harris after Biden announced he would not seek a second term precluded them from joining the contest, and should Harris win in November, 2028 might be tough as well.

The convention will give these candidates, many of them relatively young, an opportunity to build support among key Democrats and donors should they decide to run in the future. Speaking slots, breakfasts with state delegations, and post-convention events will offer would-be candidates an opportunity to make a splash.

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Four governors — Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, Gavin Newsom of California and JB Pritzker of Illinois — along with Pete Buttigieg, the secretary of transportation, have all been mentioned as potential future Democratic candidates for the White House.

What About Trump

Historically, the opposing party lays low during the other side’s convention, but don’t expect Trump to go totally quiet this week. He is planning campaign stops on every day of the convention in key battlegrounds — Pennsylvania, Michigan, North Carolina and Arizona, where he is expected to visit the U.S.-Mexico border in Montezuma Pass on Thursday, the day Harris will deliver her acceptance speech.

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This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

By Adam Nagourney/Kent Nishimura
c. 2024 The New York Times Company