WASHINGTON — Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign on Sunday is launching “Republicans for Harris” as she looks to win over Republican voters turned off by Donald Trump’s candidacy.

The program will be a “campaign within a campaign,” according to Harris’ team, using well-known Republicans to activate their networks, with a particular emphasis on primary voters who backed former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley. The program will kick off with events this week in Arizona, North Carolina and Pennsylvania. Republicans who support Harris will also show up at meetings with the vice president and her soon-to-be vice president in the coming week, the campaign said.

The Harris campaign first shared details of the program with The Associated Press before the official announcement.

Biden’s team is trying to create “a state structure” for GOP voters who would otherwise find it difficult to vote for Harris. The effort will rely heavily on Republican-to-Republican contact, with the belief that the best way to get a Republican to vote for Harris is to hear directly from another Republican who is making the same choice.

Trump’s “extremism is toxic to the millions of Republicans who no longer believe that Donald Trump’s party represents their values” and will vote against him again in November, said Harris’ national director of Republican outreach, Austin Weatherford. He said the campaign would “show up and take time every day to get the vote of Republicans who believe in putting country over party and know that every American deserves a president who will protect their liberties and a commander in chief who will put the American people’s best before their own.”

Weatherford is a former chief of staff to former Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., who had endorsed the Biden-Harris ticket before President Joe Biden’s disastrous debate performance against Trump. Kinzinger backs Harris once again as part of the launch.

“As a proud conservative, I never thought I would support a Democrat for president,” he said in a statement. “But I know that Vice President Harris will defend our democracy and ensure that Donald Trump never returns to the White House.”

Kinzinger developed a national profile as one of two Republicans on the House committee investigating the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021. The committee highlighted a number of Trump’s transgressions before and during the deadly attack as Congress sought to certify the results of the 2020 election, which Biden won over Trump.

Trump has done little to try to win over moderate Republican voters and on Saturday again criticized Republican Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, who rejected Trump’s bid to overturn the 2020 election in the battleground state.

Last month, when Biden was still at the top of the ticket, the campaign ran an ad highlighting former Trump staffers’ criticism of their former boss. A separate ad highlighted Trump’s often personal attacks on Haley, including his primary nickname of her as “bird brain” and the suggestion that “she’s not the president’s lumber.”

Hundreds of thousands of registered Republicans voted in primaries for Haley even after she ended her bid for the 2024 Republican nomination and as Trump trounced her in nearly every contest.

Haley announced in May that she would vote for Trump and appeared at last month’s Republican National Convention.

The Harris campaign’s effort includes former Govs. Bill Weld of Massachusetts and Christine Todd Whitman of New Jersey, former Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, former Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and 16 former Republican members of Congress, including Kinzinger and Reps. Joe Walsh of Illinois and Susan Molinari of New York. All have been notable critics of Trump in the past.

Trump’s former press secretary Stephanie Grisham also supports Harris.

“I may not agree with Vice President Kamala Harris on everything, but I know she will fight for our freedom, protect our democracy, and represent America with honor and dignity on the world stage,” Grisham said in a statement.