Harris' Calculated Shift
Can Kamala Harris Bridge the Divide?
“It is now our turn to do what generations before us have done, guided by optimism and faith, to fight for this country we love, to fight for the ideals we cherish, and to uphold the awesome responsibility that comes with the greatest privilege on Earth: the privilege and pride of being an American.”
-Kamala D. Harris
It’s been just over thirty days since President Joe Biden suspended his reelection bid, Vice President Harris announced her campaign, and five days since the Democrats officially nominated her. The Democratic Convention last week was a success—a massive victory for a well-run campaign and for Ms. Harris herself, who is potentially facing the most unusual road to the White House we've seen in years.
Ms. Harris introduced herself to the country in her acceptance speech. These biographical speeches, often given by politicians, can come off as self-centered, egotistical, and vain. However, her narrative avoided that, instead humanizing someone frequently struggling with presentation (recall the cringeworthy NASA video from 2021). Pundits noted the lengthy tribute to her mother, an immigrant from India, who raised her and her siblings as a single mother. Harris celebrated her mother’s resilience despite adversarial circumstances and highlighted her “trailblazing work” as a biomedical scientist specializing in breast cancer research.
She then defined herself, particularly her career as a district attorney. Ms. Harris recounted how, after discovering in high school that her close friend, Wanda, was being sexually abused by her stepfather, she was motivated to become a prosecutor: "That is one of the reasons I became a prosecutor. To protect people like Wanda because I believe everyone has a right to safety, dignity, and justice." She emphasized that her role as a prosecutor was always for the people—noting how she would always be charged not in the victim's name but “the people,” as she explained that justice is a collective responsibility and that no one should fight alone.
In formally accepting her nomination to the immense cheer of the crowd, Ms. Harris was surprisingly apolitical—she didn't mention the word “Democrat” once. Instead, she positioned herself as a leader for all Americans, transcending partisan divides and avoiding the typically left-leaning rhetoric based on grievance and class warfare. She portrayed herself as someone not hostile to America's past but equally dedicated to a hopeful, future-oriented agenda. Ms. Harris was dismissive of Mr. Trump, describing him as an “unserious man,” yet energized her base by reminding them that the consequences of his return would be “extremely serious.”
On policy, Ms. Harris offered some Republican-sounding pledges, including a commitment to border security, reiterating support for the Senate bill that failed to pass this summer, and deterrence against Iran and its proxies. Ms. Harris specifically championed support for building “the most lethal fighting force.” Domestically, she opted for a positive-sounding slogan of an “opportunity economy,” no doubt a phrase revised and tested by many pollsters. She also supported a middle-class tax cut and increasing housing availability in true 'YIMBY' fashion. Conspicuously absent was any mention of her previous positions on price controls, unrealized gains taxes, or wealth taxes—though to err on the side of caution, it would be best if she were not given a Democratic trifecta, to avoid being “infected again” by these silly notions.
Her speech was not a policy checklist, and it's clear she has a tough road ahead in winning over fencesitters—no matter how much she may try to backpedal. Her Senate voting record led to her being ranked by GovTrack as 'the most liberal,' to the left of Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders. Her flip-flops on abolishing private insurance, supporting a border wall, defunding law enforcement, and fracking gave John Kerry a run for his money. For someone in elected politics for twenty years, it's odd to recalibrate views entirely—though we’ve seen this play out before.
Her campaign’s strategy bears the hallmarks of Dick Morris’ triangulation strategy, which successfully got Bill Clinton reelected in 1996 by positioning him as neither left-wing nor right-wing but instead offering a ‘third way.’ What makes triangulation interesting in its application today is that the political coalitons and Republican Party of the Trumpian era are unrecognizable and incomparable to the GOP of 1996 and the candidacy of Bob Dole. One major shift is the suburban electorate's shift toward the Democrats—think of former Romney and McCain voters who now cast their ballots for the Democrats, and the similar rural, exurb, and working-class shift towards the Republicans. The primary clash between Haley and Trump revealed the emergence of new Republican class warfare, with Trump’s base of less-educated working-class voters going toe-to-toe with Haley’s “old-guard” constituency of wealthier, educated Republicans, independents, and disaffected Democrats—if you break down the primary results by precinct, Haley did best in wealthy suburbs that have slid away from the Republicans since 2016.
Billionaire donors and special interest groups like Americans for Prosperity were once assets of the Republican Party to the detriment of their Democratic foes. Now, however, the 'MAGA' wing finds itself at odds with these allegedly sinister forces. For evidence of the GOP's populist, and frankly left-leaning, pivot under Trump, I received a mailer from the Trump campaign addressed directly to me (oddly enough, as a young person) pledging ‘NO TAX ON SOCIAL SECURITY! PROTECT SOCIAL SECURITY AND MEDICARE!’ and a pledge that entitlement reform—a necessity—is off the table. This would have been an unthinkable policy position for a Republican nominee just eight years ago. With Trump and his MAGA movement figuratively and literally poaching the policy and voters of the 1990s Democratic Party, would it be inconceivable that the Democrats, with this sudden talk of ‘tax-cuts’ and ‘opportunity,’ are doing the same with the 1990s Republican Party—with all this talk of ‘opportunity,’ ‘freedom,’ and a new, yet undoubtedly welcome, unapologetic commitment to American exceptionalism?
Of course, I remain skeptical of this newfound centrism. No matter how much she tries to hide it, Ms. Harris is part of an administration with an average approval rating of 39%, according to FiveThirtyEight—not exactly an indication of success. I, and by extension this publication, have been very critical of the Biden administration domestically, citing its love for regulation, which has led to household energy costs escalating by approximately $10,000 since Mr. Biden took office. Additionally, the administration's economic policy and proposals have been far from ideal, and its foreign policy is particularly weak. Ms. Harris also lied a fair amount during her convention address, dramatically misrepresenting the Supreme Court ruling on Trump’s immunity case, the 2017 TCJA as just a 'tax cut for the rich,' and claiming that Trump would limit access to birth control—arguably the most far-fetched and ridiculous of them all.
Still, there are positions where I not only align with Ms. Harris but also believe she is preferable to Trump—namely on trade, in contrast to his ill-fated protectionism, and in her unapologetic commitment to NATO. While I think Mr. Trump has a decent chance of winning this election, I cannot help but have an instinctual feeling that he and the Republicans are poised for defeat. This is largely due to their abandonment of policy and principle, exacerbated by an internal civil war fueled by a hostile takeover of the party by reactionary populists and grifters. These grifters, more interested in personal gain, media attention, and short-term victories than in long-term conservative goals, have hollowed out the GOP, steering it away from its core values. If Ms. Harris wins, it will further prove that the GOP's failure to nominate Ron DeSantis or Nikki Haley was due to an electorate and conservative media more obsessed with loyalty to Trump than with enacting a sustainable, generational conservative realignment that could secure lasting electoral success.
Her victory, if it is to be, will be due to the influence of those who voted for Haley or DeSantis and would have preferred either as the nominee—voters who became disaffected with Biden’s policy, the disaster in Afghanistan, and crave a return to normalcy and efficient, effective government. They are 'center-right,' often relatively affluent, and were the coveted target of Glenn Youngkin’s successful Virginia gubernatorial campaign in 2021—a victory that followed an 11-point Democratic victory in the state the year prior. They comprise the Never-Trump or Never-Again-Trump coalition—which is vast.
Opposition to Trump’s bid from the right comes from ultra-conservatives like Mike Pence, the 'character counts' and the pious crowd (think Mitt Romney), the business-minded likes of Rob Portman and Pat Toomey, or foreign policy gurus like Bill Kristol and John Bolton. While Kristol appears to have 'crossed the aisle' to the Democratic Party, potentially never to return, it's not like the others are abandoning conservatism and rushing to embrace big government. If anything, they just want a candidate of moral integrity, competence, and effective policy. I have no doubt that most of these names, and the voters who align with them, will return to their original party loyalties when Trump and his cohort have come and gone—but until then, anything goes.
While Ms. Harris might be masking her policy as a 'Trojan horse' and pandering to focus groups, I still believe that, even if insincere, her appeals to 'freedom' and 'opportunity' show that the Democrats not only understand where the political center is but are willing to meet it. Democrats were presented with an opportunity, with Joe Biden’s victory, to unite the country after the four years of Trump. The party and Mr. Biden failed to meet the moment, instead doubling down on and indulging in divisive rhetoric and erroneous policy. Yet, instead of being punished, Democrats have been given the “reset button” in running against the same man again with a new candidate. Ms. Harris has made numerous missteps, but this gesture toward the center and embrace of reality could lead to her winning undecided voters, the presidency itself, and turning her story into one of bipartisan appeal and leadership—allowing her to be, as she is fond of saying, “unburdened by what has been.”