Jill Biden headshot 0401
CNN  — 

Democrats will gather for the second night of their virtual convention on Tuesday to make the case that Joe Biden is the best person, in this time of national upheaval, to lead the way forward.

Jill Biden, the former vice president’s wife, will be the headliner and is expected to provide a personal testament to the character of the man she married in 1977. The speech will likely emphasize Biden’s personal decency, as a father and family member – a theme that former first lady Michelle Obama, in her speech Monday, and a number of his 2020 primary rivals, frequently turn to when talking about Biden.

The first night of the convention focused on unity across ideological lines, while Tuesday’s two-hours of programming will seek to bridge another divide: The generations. The old-guard of the Democratic Party – in speeches by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York, former Secretary of State John Kerry and former President Bill Clinton – will share the spotlight with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez of New York, the young progressive star who, despite being given only a minute to speak, could provide the night’s most closely watched moment.

A range of Democrats, speaking on Biden’s behalf on Monday night, attempted to highlight the unity inside the Democratic Party by hitting Trump on his handling of racial injustices, the coronavirus pandemic and his attacks on voting by mail. The night was capped by Obama, who excoriated Trump as the “wrong” president and noted that he was unable to win the popular vote four years earlier.

Democrats, in a moment of official business during a convention that has otherwise been more of a television show, will also hold their reimagined roll call vote on Tuesday, with party members appearing on video from each of the 57 states and territories to officially announce the delegates Biden and other Democrats received from their primary or caucus.

The convention to nominate Biden is unlike any other convention in history. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, and that infection and death rates in the United States remain high, the event is being held almost entirely virtually, making what would have been a raucous, in-person affair more like a two-hour television show for four nights.

Here’s what to watch starting at 9 p.m. ET on Tuesday:

Biden, the husband and father

Jill Biden, the person who knows Joe Biden better than anyone else, will cap Tuesday night by getting personal.

When Jill Biden spoke on the campaign trail earlier this year, she often testified to her husband’s humanity and decency, a theme that organizers expect to repeat throughout the convention.

But the former second lady of the United States is expected to bring an increasingly personal touch to that argument, closing out the second night of the convention by speaking at length about her husband of more than four decades.

“A commander in chief that you can trust. A leader who brings people together. A president that you can feel proud of,” Jill Biden told voters ahead of the Iowa caucuses. “That’s my husband, Joe Biden.”

Even the location of Jill Biden’s speech – Brandywine High School in Wilmington, where she taught English in the 1990s – hints at the personal nature of the remarks. Biden’s teaching career has been central to her message on the campaign trail and she recently said she would want to keep teaching if she becomes first lady.

Jill Biden has been a regular surrogate for her husband on the campaign trail, both at in-person event earlier in the year and virtually once the pandemic ended most traditional campaigning. At those events, the former second lady touted Biden’s support among independents and ability to win in key states.

But many people can make that case for the presumptive Democratic nominee. What most Democrats hope Jill Biden will bring on Tuesday is an explanation of Joe Biden, the husband and father.

Sixty seconds of AOC

U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY)

The convention organizers only gave Ocasio-Cortez one minute to speak, but there’s a good bet those 60 seconds will be the most buzzed about of the night.

Ocasio-Cortez is, by any measure, one of the most influential young political leaders in America. She is better suited than any other Democrat to this week’s virtual medium, which has more in common with an Instagram live video than a standard convention hall address.

She won’t have much time to do it, but Ocasio-Cortez is expected to use her turn to spotlight Sanders’ success in awakening and driving forward a progressive movement that will send some of its brightest new stars to Capitol Hill next year. Still, for those holding out hope she’ll mix in a blunt rejection of Biden’s liberal-leaning centrism, disappointment awaits.

In the months since Sanders dropped out of the primary, Ocasio-Cortez has largely set aside the intra-party debates of the past (and future), focusing instead on a home district that’s been battered by the coronavirus pandemic.

She also co-chaired, along with Kerry, the Biden-Sanders “unity task force” on climate, the policy group that produced – of the six formed by the two campaigns – the recommendations regarded as most likely to surface again if Biden wins in November.

Can Bill Clinton meet this moment?

NEW YORK, NEW YORK - OCTOBER 17: Former U.S. President Bill Clinton speaks onstage during the TIME 100 Health Summit at Pier 17 on October 17, 2019 in New York City.

When Bill Clinton stepped up to the podium in Charlotte, North Carolina, in 2012, he made arguably the most cogent case for Barack Obama of the entire four-night affair, using all of his nearly 3,200-word speech to argue why the country should reelect the President.

Clinton’s speech this year, eight years and what feels like multiple political lifetimes removed, will be nothing like that.

Clinton’s speech on Tuesday night, his 11th at a Democratic convention, will be pre-taped and short, and will feature the former president delivering “sharpest rebuke he has done of Trump since ever, even sharper than he went in 2016,” a source familiar with the remarks told CNN.

The former president will center his remarks on coronavirus, the source said. Clinton will then explain why Biden has the leadership qualities needed to be president.

Clinton is capable of making this case powerfully: As one of only four former presidents still living, he knows what it takes to do the job and, as he did with Obama eight years ago and his wife, Hillary Clinton, four years later, the former president is able to explain the presidency in direct terms.

But the political climate has changed drastically in eight years, let alone since Clinton was president, and the man who was once the most prolific Democratic campaigner and fundraiser has largely been sidelined in the day-to-day campaigning of this presidential election.

Tuesday night’s speech will likely be Clinton’s highest profile moment of the campaign, and the former president will try to deliver for Biden like he has for Democrats past.

Sally Yates testifies on Trump

Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper (2nd L) and former acting U.S. Attorney General Sally Yates arrive before testifying to the Senate Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism in the Hart Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill May 8, 2017 in Washington, DC.

Sally Yates spent 10 days in the Trump administration as the acting attorney general, before being fired by the President when she told Justice Department lawyers not to defend the first iteration of his travel ban.

The Georgia native quickly became one of the first anti-Trump “resistance” heroes – and the first of many long-serving civil servants to lose their jobs or get pushed out of government jobs because they clashed with the President.

During a visit to Capitol Hill earlier this month to testify about election interference in 2016, Yates was repeatedly asked by Republican senators if she disliked Trump.

“I don’t respect the manner in which he has carried out the presidency,” she said.

On Tuesday night, she will have the opportunity to tell Americans why.

Democrats’ next generation

There will be no traditional keynote at this Democratic National Convention – instead, the party will look to highlight some of its youngest, most promising members on the same night that its old guard takes the stage.

The keynote will be delivered by 17 of the party’s rising stars, a group that ranges from top Georgia Democrat Stacey Abrams – already a veritable star inside the party – to local leaders like Pennsylvania State Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta, South Carolina State Sen. Marlon Kimpson and Nevada state Sen. Yvanna Cancela.

All 17 speakers have pre-recorded a reading of one common speech, which will be delivered in both a show of party unity and a symbol of the young, diverse bench of the Democratic Party.

“The convention keynote has always been the bellwether for the future of our party and our nation,” Joe Solmonese, the CEO of the convention, said of the unconventional keynote. “And when Americans tune in next week they’ll find the smart, steady leadership we need to meet this critical moment.”

The old guard gets a word in

If Ocasio-Cortez is speaking for a new generation of more liberal Democrats, Schumer and Kerry, the party’s presidential nominee in 2004, will offer a reminder that the older generation is in no rush to pass the torch.

How they frame that reality, at a time when Biden is both trying to juice his support with younger voters and stretch out his lead among seniors, will offer a window into the campaign’s thinking about its path to victory in November.

Kerry is a close ally of Biden’s and Schumer could, if the map breaks right, be the legislative leader tasked with pushing the Biden agenda through the Senate.

Together, they spent more than three decades as Biden’s colleagues in the upper chamber, so their words – if not expected to be soaring – will surely be instructive.