The hollow debate performance left many Democrats worried about Joe Biden’s reelection prospects in November, but the president vowed to continue the campaign despite growing calls for him to withdraw.
It’s up to him whether he stays or not, but if he believes that President Biden is the only candidate who can beat Donald Trump, I think he should remain in the race and highlight his track record.
In the end, he garnered votes from both parties to pass a $1.2 trillion infrastructure and jobs bill.
He faced legal challenges from conservatives but still delivered $153 billion in student loan debt relief to 4.3 million Americans.
He has presided over a historic decline in murder and violent property crimes, and while inflation remains a problem, stock prices are rising, jobs are being created, and no one is storming the U.S. Capitol.
But if Biden decides to drop out of the race, there is only one other person with that track record who could run: Vice President Kamala Harris.
Republicans are keenly aware of this and have already begun a campaign against her, with a message that is riddled with ageism and liberally sprinkled with racism and misogyny. Ironically, this message was first voiced by another woman of color, former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, who said “A vote for Joe Biden is a vote for Kamala Harris” when she lost the presidential election last September.
In my view, comments like Haley’s, and articles like the New York Post opinion piece claiming that Harris will be the “first DEI chair,” are intended to use Harris’ ethnic origins (her mother is Indian-American and her father is Jamaican-American) against her.
But I think that if Biden steps down and Harris becomes the nominee, these racist arguments could backfire. To paraphrase one of my favorite Bible stories, Harris’ detractors may be doing so with ill intent, but God certainly may be doing it with good intent.
Watching Harris interact with the black community, it’s clear to me that she inspires a kind of excitement that Biden never got, and I believe that would translate into votes, especially among black women, if she were the nominee.
But black women aren’t the only ones hoping for Harris. A new poll by Bendixen & Amandi shows Harris winning head-to-head against Trump, 42% to 41%, with a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points. 12% are undecided.
The outcome of the election will be decided by undecided voters. But to win in November, Harris will need to attract the support of traditional Democrats while fending off fierce criticism from the right. Can she do that? I think she can. And this assessment is based not on anything she said in the few interviews I conducted with her; it’s based on what I’ve seen.
In September 2020, when Harris was running for Biden’s presidential nomination, I covered her visit and was waiting for her to arrive on Ogontz Avenue in the Uptown neighborhood of Philadelphia. As I was standing talking to a police officer in charge of the mayor’s security, two white men drove up in a car and shouted Harris’ name before yelling expletives. Two black men in a car behind them responded by yelling the same expletives at them.
It was a knee-jerk reaction, and I laughed at the time, but looking back now, I wonder if that reaction would translate into voting. Would a Harris candidacy awaken our brothers from their political gloom? Would black men stand up to protect her from the racism and misogyny she would face?
Maybe, but the bigger question is whether more voters will support her. Given her experience as California’s attorney general, a U.S. senator, and vice president in a proven administration, the answer should be yes.
But Harris is a black woman, and, as she told me in a February interview on WURD radio from the White House, she doesn’t seem to be trying to hide that fact.
“We need to take a sober, awakened look at what’s happening,” Harris said at the time. “We have so-called elected leaders enacting laws that erase our history. Suggesting that enslaved people benefited from slavery. Banning books this year, 2024. We have so-called leaders trying to erase or overlook the true and complete history of America. We need to see it for what it is.”
If Biden steps down and Harris runs, we must accept it for what it is and select the most qualified candidate based not only on who she is but also on what she has accomplished.
