Kamala the Conqueror

Democrats, no longer in disarray

Kamala Harris is going to be the Democratic nominee for president. Joe Biden is behind her and so are almost all of the delegates headed to the August convention in Chicago. They are party insiders who will do as they are told, and she is the vice president. There is no meaningful opposition to Harris; her potential rivals have lined up to endorse her in the hopes of making the ticket. One of them will. On June 26th, I would not have believed any of this was possible, despite arguing, for almost two years, that Biden shouldn’t be running for president again. In fact, none of this would have happened had Biden’s campaign just followed the classic campaign schedule of debating the Republican on television in the fall. Instead, in a political gambit that backfired more spectacularly than any I can recall in my lifetime, Biden’s campaign forced a June debate with Trump and agreed to only one other in September. Perhaps they hoped Biden would muddle through when most people were planning their summer vacations. Had Biden turned in just a mediocre performance, failing to parry Trump but speaking coherently when the CNN moderators found him, he would have been the Democratic nominee. We know that did not happen. Instead, Biden’s aides were exposed for what they are—rank enablers—and liberal pundits could no longer pretend worrying about an 81-year-old president’s fitness to serve was a right-wing disinformation operation. And Biden, it should be said, performed far worse than the median octogenarian; Bernie Sanders wouldn’t have blurted out they we “beat Medicare” or stared slack-jawed at the TV cameras.

Even then, Biden didn’t want to leave the ticket. He held on as long as he possibly could. I was not bullish on Biden quitting. He’s the president, he’s obstinate, and there are no party mechanisms for forcing him out. This isn’t Europe. We have shell parties and there’s no such thing, anymore, as political bosses. If Biden was going to go, it had to be a mass pressure campaign of elite politicians and megadonors that convinced him personally he couldn’t stay in the race. I suspect what did Biden in was the money. George Clooney and Jeffrey Katzenberg ditching him mattered as much, if not more, as Nancy Pelosi saying basta. Without the Hollywood left and the financiers in the East, Biden would have failed to keep pace with Trump, who has become a fundraising juggernaut. Harris, in one day, raised almost $50 million, and Democratic donors are plainly excited about Biden being gone. It was notable the centrists and Blue Dogs running in marginal districts wanted Biden to drop out more than the progressive left—Sanders and AOC stuck with him to the end—but I don’t see this, ultimately, as a Big Money putsch within the Democratic Party as much as a bunch of panicked elites realizing, literally overnight, they were supporting a candidate in the throes of senility. It must said that ordinary voters felt the same way. Poll after poll showed they were worried about Biden ending his second term at 86. Anecdotally, this was all I found, with anyone who wanted to talk politics with me professing that Biden was simply too old to go on. My late father, at age 83, was incredulous, when we spoke on politics, that Biden intended to run again.

Now Harris will forge onward. The great advantage she’ll have is selecting a running mate and there will be an irony to her deliberations—prioritizing for electability, especially swing state representation—because Biden himself plainly made a poor decision in choosing her in 2020. A California senator who had flamed out so badly in her own primary campaign that she had to drop out before the Iowa Caucuses was not an ideal politician for anyone’s ticket. Biden only got this far because so few trusted Harris’ political talents. She has not distinguished herself in the Biden administration. Had Biden chosen Gretchen Whitmer, the Michigan governor, as his running mate, Whitmer might have wrapped up the nomination months ago, either winning an open primary with Biden’s endorsement or taking his place sometime in the spring. Many of the Democrats Harris is considering for her ticket—Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, Arizona Senator Mark Kelly, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, and North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper—would probably run stronger than her in the general election, not to mention Whitmer herself, Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar, or Georgia Senator Raphael Warnock.

But Harris is, unquestionably, an upgrade over Biden. She’s fit for a debate with Trump, if it ever happens, and she’ll be able to energetically stump across the country. She won’t shy away from media interviews. She’ll be able, on abortion rights, to prosecute the case against Trump. Any of the men she’s considering for a running mate would likely outperform J.D. Vance, a neophyte Trump may come to regret elevating, in any debate that occurs. Harris would make history as the nation’s first female president and the second Black president and that can’t be underplayed, either. There will be Democrats excited to show up for her. She and her running mate will benefit, too, from their newness; though Harris has been vice president, she has never topped a ticket, and there will be a fresh energy around her campaign throughout the summer. Trump and the GOP very badly wanted to run against the doddering Biden with Harris as the understudy. Now they will have to recalibrate. Suddenly, he’s the senior citizen in the race, the retread most Americans have seen before and want little to do with.

Expect the election to be close in the popular vote. I have no great predictions beyond that. Like 2020 and 2016, it will probably come down to five swing states—Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona, and Georgia—and Harris will need to find a way to win at least four of them, if not all five. Trump must still be considered a favorite. What he isn’t, any longer, is a candidate who can run up a landslide—not that, even with Biden’s frailty, that was a likely outcome. The hubris of the Republicans was always undeserved. Trump is a two-time loser of the popular vote, and his approval ratings are dismal. The Republicans are the party, now that the triumphant convention is finished, that will need to reckon with their own lot.