As it seems increasingly likely that President Biden will drop his relection bid in the near future, hopefully this coming week, precious little time is left until the August convention in which a new candidate would need to be nominated. Being an event unprecedented in my life time it's hard to see exactly how this process would go, Democrats haven't had anything approaching an open convention since 1972. Weither picked at such a convention or before hand by some other means, it seems unlikely the next Democratic nominee will be anyone other then Kamala Harris, so I wanted to take a little time to lay out what I see as her pluses and minus and likely chances of landing the office of President. Many of these thoughts have been inspired by other sources but some of them are my own.
First let's start with the negatives.
While there are some people who really like her, for the most part Kamala seems to be genrally seen as not very likable. She is not a particularly good speaker nor has she shown much in the way of charisma. As vice president she has been mostly sidelined to that point that it appears The White House has considered her a liability and limited her public role. She has no legislative or policy accomplishments to speak of either in her current role or in the senate. It's hard for me to even tell what she believes. Her time as a prosecutor and attorney general in California may even be a net negative, I've heard some very critical things about her in those roles Her placement on the ticket to begin with seems principly to check some demographic boxes rather then any inherent talents on her part. Being from California she dosen't put any swing state into play, the Golden State hasn't voted for a Republican since George H.W.Bush. She dosen't tend to generate much enthusiasm.
Now on to the pros, which are more numerous then they might at first appear.
At the top of the ticket Harris could energize black and women voters, as well as the youth vote given she would be a historic pick. As Biden's presumptive VP nominee already, there would be fewer legal complications to her accessing the campaigns considerable war chest. She would benefit, if mildly, from a kind of quasi incumbentcy and should Biden resign she would in fact be the incumbent.
Voters have been complaining for some time about the prospect of another election between these two old men. There has been a demand for new faces and while Kamala isn't exactly new, she's at least not one of those two old guys. Kamala is 18 years younger then Donald Trump. With Biden off the ticket Democrats would be able to plausibly go after Trumps age and his own mental and physical decline hard; this is something they have not been able to do before because of Biden's greater age (roughly four years), his looking a good deal older then Trump, that dismel debate performance, public gaffs and growing (and not illigmate) concerns about his capacity to do the job. Replacing Joe with Kamala removes all of that from the equation.
It is hard not to imagine racist and misogynistic attacks against Harris from Trump and his suraragtes, this would likely repell moderate and independent voters and push more of them towards Harris. Harris of course would get to name her own running mate, I would suggest finding the most charismatic and popular white male Democrats have in elected office, if that person happens to be a swing state governor so much the better, I'm looking at you Tim Walz of Minnesota and Roy Cooper of North Carolina.
Least we forget, and how could we not, the many, many liabilities of Donald Trump. A polarizing figure who has already twice lost the popular vote and never broke even a 50% approval rating as President. There are many Republican voters looking for an alternative, witness Nikky Haley's remarkably strong 2nd place finishes in Republicans primaries. Donald Trump has multiple pending legal cases against him, is known to foment hate, violence and chaos. Not to mention his being broadly associated with the unpopular supreme court decision overturning Roe v Wade. He sorounds himself with repellent and often criminal fringe figures like Steve Bannon and Roger Stone. The scary possibilities of a second Trump term as outlined in Project 2025 and elsewhere, promise an increasing authoritarian bent among Republicans, policy overreach, revenge on his political opponents, the potenal shattering of NATO and an American complicaty in a Russian victory in Ukraine, and surely loads of chaos we can't even anticipate at this juncture.
In short, despite all her short comings and liabilities I think Kamala Harris would have a really good chance of defeating Trump in November. I hope she has that chance as the odds of Biden somehow pulling off a victory seem increasingly remote with every passing day.
Thoughts?
