Vice President Kamala Harris struggled to connect with voters while her campaign aides focused on trivial issues, which contributed to her significant election loss to former President Donald Trump, according to Democratic insiders who spoke to the New York Post. Harris, 60, took over the top spot on the Democratic ticket from President Biden, 81, in late July and initially saw a surge in polling while raising nearly $1 billion over a six-week period—outpacing Trump, 78, and equipping her campaign with the resources to capitalize on her early lead against the Republican nominee.
Her inability to secure the victory frustrated Democrats, including those who worked in the Biden-Harris administration and on her campaign. “I’ve worked on five presidential campaigns. I knew this would be hard. Others acted like they knew they were going to win,” one person who lent some support during the late stretch of the race told The Post. “They were arrogant.”
Among those receiving blame on Wednesday were Harris herself and campaign chairwoman Jen O’Malley Dillon, with one insider questioning, “Where did $1 billion go?” Insiders also pointed fingers at Obama campaign veterans David Plouffe and Stephanie Cutter, alleging that they misjudged the issues that truly resonated with voters. The two of them “tried an Obama play with a non-Obama candidate,” said one source close to the Harris campaign. “They are the worst.” Ultimately, Harris failed because “people didn’t connect with her,” this person said.
“[O’Malley Dillion] managed political and ground operations — Cutter and Plouffe were doing messaging and ads and they misjudged what people cared about because cable news and Twitter are not real life. Biden should have never run [in 2024] AND the party is too far left,” the person added.
Harris’s message centered largely on restoring abortion rights and upholding democratic norms, while Trump emphasized the effects of inflation driven by government spending, which has led to nearly a 22% increase in prices since Biden and Harris took office, as well as security and economic concerns related to record levels of illegal immigration. The VP also tried to distance herself from many of her previous progressive policy positions, choosing to disavow or avoid commenting on issues such as banning hydraulic fracturing for oil and natural gas, decriminalizing illegal border crossings, and providing free gender-affirming surgeries to detained undocumented immigrants.
“F—king idiots,” a third Democratic source said of the messaging. “People are fed up. How’s that Inflation Reduction Act working out, Chuck [Schumer]? I think broadly the staff of Democratic campaigns are not representative of the country,” said the source who worked on the Harris campaign late in the race. “These staffers, advisers and consultants who went to Ivy League schools and are [Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez] liberals don’t represent real Americans. The campaign staff live in a vacuum of ‘they/them’ and ‘Latinx.’”
“I also think field programs don’t do anything and Dems have such faith in field and door knocking. Trump didn’t do any of that,” the source noted further, a reference to the massive Harris initiative to get volunteers to knock on doors in swing states such as Pennsylvania. Biden, whom Democratic mutineers forced to step aside over his apparent cognitive decline, “would have been crushed. But [Michigan Gov. Gretchen] Whitmer, [and North Carolina Gov.] Roy Cooper would have won,” the campaign alum claimed.
“I blame Biden for not announcing earlier that he wouldn’t run. Dems could have had a robust open primary,” this person continued, while adding: “I think [the briefly floated concept of a] mini-primary was a pipe dream.” Meanwhile, another Democrat insider sounded off to The Post as well. “She was a s–t candidate and Trump made her look worse than Hillary Clinton,” that source told The Post. “Biden didn’t deserve that treatment and he got pushed out for an empty pantsuit. At least Biden beat Trump and Hillary Clinton had more balls than either of them.”
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