Kamala Harris will be the Democratic nominee for US President. She succeeds President Biden who, compelled by party pressure, the polls, and perhaps his own mortality, will not be running for re-election.
Voters don’t think the US is going in the right direction; and they are feeling little of the so-called recovery put about by the Biden administration. The cost of living has been king in a lot of elections this year (not least in Britain). And so incumbents – like Joe Biden – who talk of recoveries when their electorate do not feel like it are tarnished. But Harris’s can semi-convincingly market herself as a candidate in her own right, a moderate departure from Biden’s incumbency.
The jury is still out on how far behind Harris is from Trump. Her arrival has rallied the Democratic base, but it is hard for energy like that to self-sustain.
As we enter the final few months of the 2024 cycle here are a few things that will help us work out whether Kamala Harris can deny Donald Trump the White House on 5th November.
Will black voters turn out?
Biden went into the 2020 election boasting high approvals among black voters – Harris too. Of course, the vote is not homogeneous. The moderate, small-c conservatives were compelled by Biden’s own moderation. But anticipated turnout among black voters in a Trump/Biden election was low. In fact, Trump’s base writ large are more engaged in this election than the Democrat base.
Biden had a net favourability among black voters of +41; Harris has a net favourability of +60 (NYTimes/Siena). This could push up Harris's numbers in states like Georgia and North Carolina, where Biden was polling 5 and 6 points behind respectively. A Harris candidacy will narrow these races.
Trump's net favourability is -52 (it looks worse than it is: on polling day in 2020 that figure sat at -70). Siena didn't do particularly well in polling in 2020 (overstating the Democrats' figures, for example). But the shift is salient. Trump - no longer the incumbent - hasn't been as toxifying a force across the United States as Brits perceive from the outside. His favourables among minority voters are up, marginally.
Nevertheless a Harris candidacy is an improvement on Biden among black voters. The question, however, is to what extent will this translate into a rejuvenated turnout?
Are young voters this cheesed off?
Young voters in the US are not happy. Small samples show as many 18-34 year olds disapprove of Joe Biden as much as they do Donald Trump. Sometimes more. This, from the strata of US society that split almost 3-1 for Biden in 2020, is a staggering shift.
There are two possibilities: either this is real voter fallout over issues like Palestine; or US pollsters have accrued bad samples. It's not unreasonable, for example, to suggest an online poll of 1,000 people who spend an unrepresentative amount of time on social media (at the expense of the median voter who is not au fait with the 24/7 news cycle) would return an unrepresentative sample. It was happening in Britain, so it can certainly happen in the US - a wild west for political opinion polling.
If this is the case, then who is being under-sampled? We might contend that the Democrat youth base is not as unhappy as the initial numbers suggest. But if the data is bad here then it is bad elsewhere. What about the logged-off, anti-system voters for whom Donald Trump was their political saviour? Pollsters were meant to correct for that after fudging the numbers last time. But could they be overcorrecting?
Younger, woke Americans are appreciably dissatisfied with the Biden administration's relationship with Israel. It has likely depressed willing youth turnout for the next election. It is unclear if Harris can turn that around. She should hope something has gone wrong in the polls.
Will Independent voters still back a moderate, in this economy?
This is a traditional unknown in American elections. Registered independents are voters who identify with neither Republicans or Democrats. They have grown in number in recent decades and in 2020 they swing from Trump to Biden in a big way. The numbers for Trump were abysmal and these voters - heavy in the likes of Arizona, Nevada and North Carolina - made it known at the polls.
These voters were broadly moderate. Their focus is the economy and the cost of living will loom large in their voting intentions. Harris's moderation should help her coax some of them back. But Biden was less popular than Trump among them in July.
Few feel the economic uptick so Kamala should avoid campaigning on her incumbent's record. Harris's challenge is to maintain her moderate visage with the recognition that things still aren't working. In the great Steady As She Goes vs Shake Things Up style of politics, the American electorate currently veers towards the latter. Harris - moderate in tone and policy - should not forget that if she wants to win.
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