A diverse group of Democratic leaders is delivering the keynote address on the second night of the party’s convention, appearing in a montage of spliced together clips to deliver a stinging critique of President Donald Trump’s leadership.

“We know Joe Biden. America, we need Joe Biden,” said Stacey Abrams, the former Georgia gubernatorial candidate.

The keynote address is a moment that has often been seized by political up-and-comers to deliver a soaring message. That includes Barack Obama, who rocketed to stardom in 2004 when John Kerry was the nominee.

But because the pandemic led to the cancellation of an in-person convention, Democrats opted to showcase a diverse group of local leaders in one video message on Tuesday.

“It didn’t have to be this bad. In the early days of the virus, Donald Trump didn’t listen to the experts,” said Nikki Fried, Florida’s agriculture commissioner.

Long Beach, California, Mayor Robert Garcia added: “We are facing the biggest economic and health crisis in generations because our president didn’t -- and still doesn’t -- have a plan.”

The speakers contrasted Trump’s leadership with that of Biden and their own, presenting the Democratic ticket as a safe choice for those who are worried.

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HERE’S WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THE DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL CONVENTION:

— Democrats' Day 2 focus: Trump's global leadership deficit

— Here’s what to watch on the second night of the convention

— After years of big moments, Bill Clinton's DNC role shrinks

— Cindy McCain details husband’s friendship with Biden for DNC

— At DNC, Jill Biden to get personal about family's struggles

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Follow AP’s election coverage at https://apnews.com/Election2020

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HERE’S WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING:

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell plans to say at the Democratic National Convention that he supports Joe Biden for president because of the values they share.

Powell served as secretary of state under Republican President George W. Bush from 2001 until 2005, and served as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under both Bush and Democratic President Bill Clinton.

In an advance clip of his speech Tuesday, Powell says that Biden shares “the values I learned growing up in the South Bronx and serving in uniform” and that he supports him for president because “we need to restore those values to the White House.”

Powell, who is a decorated four-star general, also says that the country “needs a commander in chief who takes care of our troops in the same way he would his own family.” Powell says Biden knows how to do just that because his son Beau served in the Army National Guard.

Powell called President Donald Trump a liar and endorsed Biden in June. He’s one of a handful of prominent Republicans, including former Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Cindy McCain, the wife of deceased Arizona Sen. John McCain, set to speak at the Democratic National Convention.

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A security guard who gushed over meeting Joe Biden in an elevator during his visit with The New York Times editorial board will be the first person to put his name into nomination for president at the Democratic National Convention.

Jacquelyn Brittany is one of three people putting Biden’s name into nomination on Tuesday night. She’ll be joined by Sen. Chris Coons and Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester, both from Delaware.

The 31-year-old, who has declined to share her last name publicly, was filmed telling the former vice president “I love you” as she escorted him to the newspaper’s editorial board meeting. While Biden lost the paper’s endorsement, his team elevated the clip of Brittany as evidence that Biden appeals to average working Americans rather than elites.

Biden deputy campaign manager Kate Bedingfield tweeted that Jacquelyn’s was “the most powerful endorsement of the 2020 cycle.”

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Jill Biden will offer a personal glimpse into her family’s struggles and vouch for her husband’s ability to lead the nation through adversity during remarks at the Democratic National Convention.

According to advance remarks, she plans to say Tuesday night: “There are times when I couldn’t imagine how he did it — how he put one foot in front of the other and kept going.” She adds, “But I’ve always understood why he did it. ... He does it for you.”

Jill and Joe Biden have faced considerable personal loss. Biden’s first wife and infant daughter were killed in a 1972 crash. Jill and Joe Biden faced tragedy together when son Beau died of brain cancer in 2015.

Mrs. Biden will speak about what it takes to “make a broken family whole”: “The same way you make a nation whole. With love and understanding — and with small acts of compassion.”

Mrs. Biden will also speak about her work as a teacher. She’s delivering the speech from her former classroom at Brandywine High in Wilmington, Delaware.

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Cindy McCain is going to bat for Joe Biden, lending her voice to a video set to air during Tuesday night’s Democratic National Convention programming focused on Biden’s close friendship with her late husband, Republican Sen. John McCain.

In an advance clip from the video shared with The Associated Press, Cindy McCain talks about how then-Delaware Sen. Biden met her husband when John McCain was assigned to be a military aide for the senator on a trip overseas.

Cindy McCain is not expected to offer an explicit endorsement, but her involvement in the video is her biggest public show of support yet for Biden’s candidacy.

Both Cindy McCain and her daughter Meghan have been outspoken critics of President Donald Trump, and the family is longtime friends with the Bidens. Trump, a Republican, targeted John McCain personally in 2015, saying the former prisoner of war wasn’t a hero “because he was captured. I like people who weren’t captured.”

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Democrat Joe Biden says virtual gatherings are the conventions of the future and that he doubts they will go back to what they did before the coronavirus pandemic.

The presumptive presidential nominee made the comment Tuesday while addressing an online group of delegates from Florida.

He called this week’s virtual Democratic National Convention “the most creative, inclusive convention we’ve ever had.” He says, “I doubt we’ll ever go back to the same, exact convention we had in the past.”

Also on Tuesday’s call, Biden questioned whether President Donald Trump is smart enough to be president. Biden says he used to think Trump was “callous,” but now thinks “he’s just not smart enough to know what to do.”

The Democrats’ original convention in Milwaukee was delayed from July until August and scaled back amid the coronavirus outbreak.

The Republican Party will hold its own virtual convention next week.

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Former President Jimmy Carter is making his first appearance at a presidential nominating convention in eight years.

Organizers of the Democratic National Convention announced Tuesday that Carter and his wife, Rosalynn, would address attendees at the virtual gathering that evening.

The 39th president, 95, did not attend the 2016 convention in Philadelphia. He did record a speech for the 2012 gathering, which was broadcast in prime time on that convention’s second night.

Democrats opened this cycle’s nominating convention on Monday night with a keynote from former first lady Michelle Obama. Other speakers scheduled for Tuesday include Jill Biden, wife of former Vice President Joe Biden, and former President Bill Clinton.

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Former Secretary of State John Kerry is condemning President Donald Trump’s foreign policy as he prepares to address the Democratic National Convention, saying the United States "is not the leader of the free world.”

Speaking online to reporters during the daily convention briefing Tuesday, the 2004 Democratic presidential nominee said, “The world does not have a leader in the free world at this moment.”

Kerry faults Trump for pulling away from traditional European allies and failing to have a cohesive foreign policy strategy. He says French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel are “casting about trying hard.”

Kerry says no one easily replaces what former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and others "have frequently reminded people is the indispensable nation.”

Kerry was secretary of state during President Barack Obama’s second term.

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The third-ranking Democrat in the U.S. House says that Black people should not be blamed for any violence that has erupted during the summer’s protests following George Floyd's death.

Majority Whip Jim Clyburn told Fox News Channel's “Fox & Friends” on Tuesday “that is not who I am, that is not who we are,” of the outbursts that have occurred amid mostly peaceful protests across the country.

Clyburn is the highest-ranking Black member of Congress. He spoke a day after his remarks at the opening night of the Democratic National Convention, where he advocated for former Vice President Joe Biden as a president who could unite the country following what he characterized as four divisive years under President Donald Trump.

Clyburn says the protest efforts were undertaken by those “trying to make this country be a better place for our children and our grandchildren." He says, “We’re aren’t trying to burn it down — we’re trying to build it up.”

Democrats convene virtually Tuesday for the convention’s second night, with remarks from Jill Biden and former President Bill Clinton.

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President Donald Trump is pushing back against former first lady Michelle Obama, claiming that her husband’s Oval Office performance is what catapulted him into the White House.

In her remarks Monday night at the Democratic National Convention, Mrs. Obama declared Trump was “in over his head” and the “wrong president for our country.”

In tweets Tuesday morning Trump taunted that someone should explain to her that he wouldn’t be in the “beautiful White House” today if it “weren’t for the job done by her husband,” President Barack Obama.

He also criticized the Obamas for making a “late and unenthusiastic endorsement” of Joe Biden. And in other tweets, Trump criticized Obama and Biden’s handling of the H1N1 swine flu in 2009 and claimed, without evidence, that the Obama administration was the most corrupt in history.

Trump ended with a sarcastic thanks to Michelle Obama for her “very kind words.”