Has Kamala Harris run a bad campaign? If she wins the election on 5 November, many of the dubious choices she’s made over the past three months won’t seem ill-advised, but strategic. If a majority in swing states such as Pennsylvania and Wisconsin vote for her, then perhaps her decision to court the approval of Republicans like Dick and Liz Cheney and institutions like Goldman Sachs won’t be seen as deluded, but discerning. Or if Arab-Americans in Michigan turn out for her in large numbers rather than staying home on election day, then her decision not to campaign forcefully for a ceasefire in Gaza won’t seem cowardly, but canny. And if enough undecided voters choose Harris out of fear of what a second Trump presidency could do to American democracy, then her endless talk about the threat her opponent poses won’t seem desperate; it will seem shrewd.
But Harris is not winning. The polls – despite all the money (her team has raised as much as $1bn over the past three months) and hype that buoyed her early campaign – have remained stubbornly static in recent weeks, with Harris tied with or slightly trailing Donald Trump. Across the swing states – in addition to Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, the other hotly contested states are Georgia, Nevada, Arizona and North Carolina – the picture is worse. Even in the battleground races where she’s ahead, such as in Nevada, most polls are so close that they are within the margin of error. More alarming for the Democrats is that, historically, polls have undercounted Trump’s support in key states. As election day nears, the realisation that Harris could lose is spreading across her party, the media and the electorate. One senses low-level panic among the Democrats’ high command.
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