Bernd Debusmann Jr.
Reporting from Kalamazoo, Michigan

image source, Bernd Debusmann Jr / BBC

For journalists, tracking the campaign can be a time-consuming task. The media “presets” where we set up the cameras often occur hours before the actual events.

For example, this morning, I arrived at the rally site at 06:30 local time, well before today’s rally around 16:00.

I was a little surprised to find a lone rally participant standing on the then-cold, dark Michigan morning: 25-year-old Matt Jansen.

Jansen lives in St. Louis, Missouri, and drove nearly seven hours through the night to see Kamala Harris and Michelle Obama here today after getting off work on Friday.

“Harris rallies look great, like a party,” says Jansen, who runs the politics-focused TikTok. “It was on the bucket list.”

“I’m just here to share the enthusiasm and be a part of the movement that’s happening,” he adds. “And to see Michelle Obama.”

Jansen has a long list of issues that are important to him in this election. But she says the most urgent are abortion rights.

“I’m horrified for women. I don’t know how we can call ourselves a great, free country when we take away half the population’s rights,” she explains. “It blows my mind.”

“What if I decide to have children and I have any problems with my partner?” Jansen adds. “Trump wants to turn us back. I don’t want that.”