Kamala Harris Finds Her Footing on Race – She’s been one of the most unimpressive, disappointing politicos in a long time.
Having been billed as the “female Obama” by many admirers in the run-up to the 2020 Presidential Election, Kamala Harris—then the senator representing California—bailed out of that election shortly before the Democratic Party’s California Presidential Primary took place because she believed she couldn’t even win her own state (she was likely right, by the way).
Nevertheless, for various reasons pertaining to the inherent obsession by the DNC with race and gender politics, Joe Biden was compelled to pick this dud as his running-mate.
A safe choice who resonated (slightly) with enough minority voters that she was able to help push “Sleepy” Joe Biden over the finish line in 2020, as vice-president, even the otherwise turgid President Joe Biden has been “annoyed” with his number two for not “rising to the occasion.”
Kamala Harris: A Failure to Thrive
After all, Harris was given an extensive policy portfolio by the president with which to cut her teeth, and presumably make both herself—and the president—look good.
Thus far, Kamala Harris has utterly failed.
This is partly because the portfolio she was given includes such issues as ending the ongoing border crisis as well as bringing the Ukraine War to an end.
Even the best statesman would have difficulty achieving these tasks.
Given that the Democratic Party is on the other side of ending both the humanitarian crisis at the southwestern border as well as the fact that implicit policy of the Democratic Party in Ukraine is to continue risking nuclear world war with Russia, Harris was doomed to fail from the outset.
Many of Harris’ critics have accused her of being nothing more than a diversity hire. According to these voices on the Right, Harris was someone who was put on the ballot next to aging, white, Joe Biden, because she could generate interest from minority voters who were otherwise ambivalent about Biden’s campaign in 2020.
There might be some truth to that assessment, as politically incorrect as it sounds.
To make matters worse for herself, Vice President Kamala Harris, a former attorney general for California and a graduate of the prestigious Howard University, appears to have lost her ability to speak in public. Very often, Harris’ speeches are nothing more than a series of nonsensical, Selina Meyer-esque empty platitudes punctuated by bizarre, uncomfortable cackles.
That is, until recently.
Kamala Harris Takes a Turn
A turning point began—albeit slowly—last summer, when the conservative Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) overturned Roe v. Wade (contrary to popular opinion, though, the court’s decision did not ban abortion. SCOTUS simply left up the matter of abortion to the individual states to decide whether they would allow for the practice to occur in their states or not).
Alas, the Left fabricated outrage over the matter; that outrage ginned up enough female voters going into the 2022 Midterm Elections, in which the Democratic Party was slated to lose, and those enraged women who mistakenly believed SCOTUS had banned abortion outright voted to keep the Democrats in power.
Vice-President Harris was an instrumental element of ginning up those angry female voters.
Appealing to African-Americans
There was much talk during Harris’ 2020 bid for election that she didn’t resonate well with African-American male voters. Indeed, her record as California’s top cop, in which she rubbed Progressives the wrong way (thanks to her tough-on-crime stances as it related to drug offenses which disproportionately impacted black men), helped to depress some African-American male voter turnout for the Biden-Harris ticket.
Yet, that depression was minimal when compared to votes Kamala Harris’ appeal along ethnic and gender lines.
Similarly, Florida’s recent passage of a new middle school history curriculum which attempts to provide greater historical context behind slavery, has been met with much consternation from elements on both the Left and the Right.
Former Congressman Will Hurd (R-TX), a former CIA operative and himself a person of color (and former House colleague Florida’s current Governor Ron DeSantis) chided that slavery “wasn’t a jobs program.”
More to the point, though, when informed of the change, Vice President Harris rearranged her schedule so that she could address a large audience of minority voters in Jacksonville, Fla.
Once in DeSantis’ home state, Harris gave a fiery speech denouncing both DeSantis and his Republican Party for trying to “gaslight” Americans into thinking that slavery was somehow acceptable or not as bad as it has been claimed to be.
Of course, DeSantis and the Republicans claim that the Democrats are misrepresenting what the new law does.
To be clear, the new law does not glorify slavery in any way at all. Just as the conservative SCOTUS’ successful overturning of Roe v. Wade did not end the practice of abortion in America, though, Harris seems to have found her footing in effectively denouncing the new conservative educational platform in Florida.
Harris is Most Effective at Identity Politics
So, Harris is at her most dangerous from a GOP electoral standpoint when she is speaking on matters of race and gender.
Thus, one can anticipate that Harris and the Democratic Party, in general, will spend an inordinate time bringing every issue back to race and gender in the 2024 campaign against whoever ends up being the GOP nominee.
To better defend against these attacks, the Republican candidate must either pick a person of color and/or a female.
But even then that might not be sufficient enough to repel Harris’ barrage of identity politics.
Kamala Harris has been a disaster overall as vice president. In a few key areas related to identity politics, though, she proves to be an effective attack dog for President Biden and the Democrats.
Republicans would be wise to keep this in mind and prepare accordingly to counter these radically identitarian attacks that Harris will subject her opponents to in 2024.
A 19FortyFive Senior Editor, Brandon J. Weichert is a former Congressional staffer and geopolitical analyst who is a contributor at The Washington Times, as well as at American Greatness and the Asia Times. He is the author of Winning Space: How America Remains a Superpower (Republic Book Publishers), Biohacked: China’s Race to Control Life (Encounter Books), and The Shadow War: Iran’s Quest for Supremacy (July 23). Weichert can be followed via Twitter @WeTheBrandon.
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