Harris Has A Chance If She's Learned From Her Failures

Kamala Harris, who ran a miserable campaign for President and had a rocky start as Vice President, will likely be nominated as the Democratic Presidential nominee next month.

Unlike President Biden, who top Democrats , led by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, believed had almost no chance to beat Donald Trump, Harris would at least be in the ball game, if she learned lessons from her previous poor performances.

Biden reluctantly withdrew from the race Sunday, under pressure, and endorsed his Vice President.

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Many Democrats, relieved at the President’s decision, still have concerns about Harris. Republicans will try to define her in the coming days, and it’s critical that she challenge and counter that. Unlike her ill-fated 2019 campaign, she has to settle now on her campaign issue and strategy.

There are signs that she may be ready this time. The former prosecutor will be much more able than Biden to go on the offense against Trump and running mate J.D. Vance on abortion rights, an issue which helps Democrats a lot, but which Biden was uncomfortable. . Most importantly, there are clear signs that her private performance in the past couple years is much different than the public perception. 

"She is much more confident than before and able to talk about any issue," says  Blair Effron, a Wall Street investment banker, who has brought leading business and financial leaders to private sessions with her over the past year or so. "Most go in not so sure and come out "Wow, she’s impressive,' Republicans and Democrats. I don’t know who will support her but they appreciate that she has acquired a grasp of the U.S. and international economy." 

Almost immediately, Harris is going to be confronted with whether she was aware of any slippage in Biden’s cognitive command. There will be a refrain from the famous Senator Howard Baker’s Watergate question: “What did you know and when did you know it?”

If she’s the nominee, given the extraordinary circumstances of this year, her Vice Presidential choice will be more relevant. The conventional wisdom, which may be right this time, is the two leading candidates: two popular, young governors, Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania and Andy Beshear of Kentucky. There had been idol speculation she might want to pick Michigan’s Gretchen Whitmer for the first all-female ticket, but that seems unlikely in this situation, especially given that Harris tends to be risk-averse.

She would certainly inherit the campaign infrastructure and fundraising of the Biden/Harris Campaign, but she should pick an experienced political hand as the campaign manager. Former New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu, who is currently one of Biden’s senior advisors, would be a good contender for campaign manager.

She certainly needs to avoid her 2019 campaign mistakes, bifurcated in both personal and policy. That was typified by having campaign headquarters in California and Baltimore, run by her campaign manager and her sister. It didn’t work, and she needs new people this time.

It was a similar picture on policy. She never could figure out her position on healthcare, between embracing a single-player plan or instead building on the Affordable Care Act. Early on, she spoke about making racial justice a centerpiece of her effort, but that never developed.

In this short campaign, she has to be the Democratic nominee who is a Black and South Asian- American woman, and not the other way around. The models would be Barack Obama, as the first Black major party nominee in 2008 and JFK’s Catholicism.

The Trump operatives will try to wrap Biden’s unpopularity around her, especially immigration and inflation. She was given a charge to examine the root causes of the surge at the southern border, but unlike the GOP accusations, she was not put in charge.

She also will have to be ready for more than a little racism, which will come naturally to the Trump team. One of Trump’s senior campaign advisors, Chris LaCivita, directed some of the “swift boat” attacks against Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry in 2004, questioning the Democratic nominee’s service in Vietnam. Senator John McCain called these attacks “dishonest and dishonorable".”

Despite the challenges and the political problems she has encountered, Harris retains an ability to light up a room politically. There's little question that Donald Trump would much rather have had another debate with Joe Biden and might have trouble dealing with her on a stage.