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Kamala’s identity politics fail · The Front

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: From The Australian. I'm Claire Harvey a special bonus episode
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  Speaker 1: of The Front for You Today. How did Kamala Harris
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: and the Democrats fail so comprehensively? Gender, race, and celebrity
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  Speaker 1: all played out in ways the Harris campaign didn't expect
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  Speaker 1: and delivered Donald Trump back to the White House. Today?
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  Speaker 1: Are US reporter Joe Kelly helps me soort rhetoric from
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  Speaker 1: reality In the wake of the democrats defeat.
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  Speaker 2: Welcome the next President of these United States, Hamma Harras Good, Seek.
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  Speaker 1: Seek, No. She couldn't. Kamala Harris couldn't turn around the
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  Speaker 1: disastrous campaign begun by Joe Biden. She couldn't convince voters
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  Speaker 1: she knew how to ease their grocery prices. She couldn't
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  Speaker 1: ease fear and anger about illegal immigration. When she was
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  Speaker 1: handed the chalice by a faltering Joe Biden back in July,
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  Speaker 1: Harris chose to go for optimism.
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  Speaker 3: I will be a president for all Americans. This has
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  Speaker 3: not been about a fight that is against something. This
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  Speaker 3: is about a fight that is for something. We are
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  Speaker 3: not going back. We are not going back.
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  Speaker 1: But it turned out too few Americans were in the
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  Speaker 1: mood for her brand of joy. Harris left her dejected
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  Speaker 1: supporters waiting on election night and then took until Thursday morning,
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  Speaker 1: Australian time, more than twelve hours after the confetti settled
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  Speaker 1: at Trump's victory, everty to concede defeat.
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  Speaker 4: My heart is full today. My heart is full today.
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  Speaker 5: I thought the speech was disappointing from Kamala Harris. I
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  Speaker 5: think this was a comprehensive defeat for the Democrats, and
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  Speaker 5: I felt she was doubling down on failure.
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  Speaker 1: Joe Kelly is part of our reporting team in the
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  Speaker 1: United States.
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  Speaker 4: I spoke with President elect Trump and congratulated him on
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  Speaker 4: his victory. I also told him that we will help
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  Speaker 4: him and his team with their transition and that we
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  Speaker 4: will engage in a peaceful transfer of power. A fundamental
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  Speaker 4: principle of American democracy is that when we lose an election,
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  Speaker 4: we accept the result. That principle, as much as any other,
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  Speaker 4: distinguishes democracy from monarchy or tyranny, and anyone who seeks
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  Speaker 4: the public trust must honor it.
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  Speaker 5: There was nothing in there about what the Democrats need
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  Speaker 5: to do moving forward, or reconnecting with the working or
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  Speaker 5: middle class of America. I think that was a mistake,
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  Speaker 5: and that key line in the speech was.
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  Speaker 6: I am here to say while I conceide this election,
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  Speaker 6: I do not concede the fight that fueled this campaign.
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  Speaker 5: Well, you just lost. So I think it was problematic,
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  Speaker 5: But in some ways, I think it's typical of the
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  Speaker 5: Democrat mentality out in various states. When I was speaking
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  Speaker 5: to people, most of the Republican supporters were voting on issues.
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  Speaker 5: They were talking about the economy, they were talking about
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  Speaker 5: the price of their groceries, they were talking about the border.
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  Speaker 5: Most of the Democratic supporters were talking about Donald Trump's character.
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  Speaker 5: So I felt that Trump engaged with these people concerned
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  Speaker 5: about their everyday lives the cost of living. Harris didn't
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  Speaker 5: cut through to them, and I think the campaign was
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  Speaker 5: exposed for being out of touch. I think it was
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  Speaker 5: a mistake. She should have been more accommodating. She should
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  Speaker 5: have said that they would have listened to the message,
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  Speaker 5: they would have taken heed of the result and essentially
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  Speaker 5: sort of reassessed moving forward. There was none of that
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  Speaker 5: in that regard. I think it was not a politically
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  Speaker 5: clever speech from Kamala Harris.
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  Speaker 4: On the campaign, I would often say, when we fight,
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  Speaker 4: we win, but here's the thing. Here's the thing. Sometimes
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  Speaker 4: the fight takes a while. That doesn't mean we won't win.
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  Speaker 1: The important thing.
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  Speaker 3: Is don't ever give up.
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  Speaker 4: Don't ever give up, don't ever stop trying to make
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  Speaker 4: the world a better place.
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  Speaker 1: Something that always strikes me about American politicians, candidates for
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  Speaker 1: President Joe is that they have themselves introduced at rallies.
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  Speaker 1: We heard Oprah Winfrey introducing Kamala Harris with this phrase,
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  Speaker 1: welcome the next president of the United States. Both sides
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  Speaker 1: do that. They do that in every election campaign. It's
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  Speaker 1: really the opposite of what we hear in Australia, isn't it,
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  Speaker 1: Where politicians are trying to encourage their supporters to think
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  Speaker 1: that their vote matters. You must vote for me, otherwise
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  Speaker 1: I might not get elected. In Harris's case, obviously now
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  Speaker 1: it's embarrassing to look back and see that she's not
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  Speaker 1: the president of the United States. What do you think
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  Speaker 1: about that kind of bullish, optimistic sentiment that she invoked
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  Speaker 1: at her rallies.
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  Speaker 5: I think it's something that happens on both sides. But
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  Speaker 5: I think the problem for Kamala Harris was this sense
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  Speaker 5: of elitism that was associated with her campaign you know,
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  Speaker 5: she had this congo line of celebrity endorsements rock stars,
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  Speaker 5: big musicians, Lady Gaga, Beyonce, Bruce Springsteen, eminem. But at
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  Speaker 5: the end of the day, the result shows that it
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  Speaker 5: doesn't matter what celebrity endorsements you have. It doesn't matter
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  Speaker 5: what a less celebrities hitching themselves to your wagon. People
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  Speaker 5: want to vote on the issues, and.
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  Speaker 3: When Congress passes a bill to restore reproductive freedom nationwide,
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  Speaker 3: as President of the United States, I will proudly sign
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  Speaker 3: it into law.
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  Speaker 1: One of the issues that Harris leant on heavily was abortion,
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  Speaker 1: but she kind of turned that into an identity point
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  Speaker 1: Joe telling women that they should be fearful of a
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  Speaker 1: Trump presidency, that he would enact a national abortion and
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  Speaker 1: kind of assuming that women would get that and would
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  Speaker 1: vote for her. Educated in young women, of course, in
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  Speaker 1: large numbers did vote for Harris responding to that rhetoric
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  Speaker 1: about abortion, But it seems many other women, particularly in
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  Speaker 1: the suburbs, had other priorities, like the cost of groceries.
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  Speaker 1: So do you think that focus on abortion was misjudged
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  Speaker 1: by her or was it just that she mangled the message.
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  Speaker 5: I think it was too narrow. I think it's fine
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  Speaker 5: for them to promote that message on abortion, which is
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  Speaker 5: obviously very important to many women in their base, and
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  Speaker 5: you need to get the base out. But obviously women
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  Speaker 5: have different views on all sorts of political issues, so
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  Speaker 5: I think the campaign lacked depth in its appeal to women.
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  Speaker 5: But this was not a problem that was limited to
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  Speaker 5: women only. The coalition which she was hoping to cobble
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  Speaker 5: together didn't end up materializing at the end of the day,
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  Speaker 5: So in terms of Black communities, Ltis communities, these communities
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  Speaker 5: still on average, shifted towards Trump. This was a big
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  Speaker 5: shock result for Harris, and Kamala Harris didn't do any
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  Speaker 5: better than Joe Biden did four years before. So you'd
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  Speaker 5: have to say her campaign was disappointing in that regard,
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  Speaker 5: and that she needed to add more flesh to the
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  Speaker 5: bone to really get this broad coalition she wanted over
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  Speaker 5: the line, and she didn't. I think you're correct to
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  Speaker 5: identify the fact that simply a hollow appeal to identity
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  Speaker 5: politics doesn't cut it. There needs to be more substance there.
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  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris spent a lot of time during the campaign
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  Speaker 1: talking about Donald Trump's character.
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  Speaker 4: Well, I think this is so rich coming from someone
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  Speaker 4: who has been prosecuted for national security crimes, economic crimes,
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  Speaker 4: election interference, has been found liable for sexual assault, and
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  Speaker 4: his next big court appearance is in November at his
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  Speaker 4: own criminal sentencing.
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  Speaker 1: You can see why it was tempting for Kamala Harris,
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  Speaker 1: of course, to talk about his character in the hopes
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  Speaker 1: that people didn't like all those things about him, didn't
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  Speaker 1: like his crude language and the way he spoke about
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  Speaker 1: women in particular. But it didn't work for her, So
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  Speaker 1: was that a misfire too.
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  Speaker 5: Look, I think this was the great trap when it
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  Speaker 5: comes to Donald Trump. This was the trap that the
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  Speaker 5: Democrats fell into in twenty sixteen. It didn't work, Then
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  Speaker 5: it worked with Joe Biden, and it didn't work again. Now,
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  Speaker 5: I think it was so tempting, and it's an easy
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  Speaker 5: campaign to run, but it only had a fifty percent
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  Speaker 5: track record. So I think it was a mistake to
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  Speaker 5: have so squarely focused so much of the campaign on
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  Speaker 5: this relentless character attack. When you go negative, I think
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  Speaker 5: you have to accompany that negative campaign with positive offerings,
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  Speaker 5: and I don't think that there was enough there. And
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  Speaker 5: people also have to believe that the person who is
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  Speaker 5: actually going negative has credibility, And I think people felt
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  Speaker 5: Donald Trump was a known quantity. He'd been president before,
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  Speaker 5: they were familiar with his style, they knew the problematic
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  Speaker 5: aspects of his personality, of his character. But at the
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  Speaker 5: end of the day, this negative campaign from Kamala Harris
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  Speaker 5: also probably shone a spotlight on the fact that people
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  Speaker 5: didn't feel they knew too much about her, that she
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  Speaker 5: was a bit of an unknown quantity. Her campaign was
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  Speaker 5: one hundred and seven days, and so in that regard,
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  Speaker 5: I think it was a bit of a risk to
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  Speaker 5: go down this well worn route of character assassination against
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  Speaker 5: Donald Trump.
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  Speaker 1: Coming up, how do the Democrats start picking better candidates.
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  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris was on the ticket for this election campaign
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  Speaker 1: from the beginning as vice president. Then Joe Biden's debate
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  Speaker 1: car crash happened.
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  Speaker 5: Yeah, when I'm going to do to fix the Texas
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  Speaker 5: for example, Oh, we had one thousand tillionaires an Antha
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  Speaker 5: and a billionaires anthy.
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  Speaker 1: He stepped down shortly afterwards.
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  Speaker 3: Nothing, nothing can come in the way of saving our democracy.
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  Speaker 6: That includes personal ambition.
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  Speaker 1: So Harris had one hundred and seven days to try
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  Speaker 1: to defeat Donald Trump. She certainly pulled the polls a
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  Speaker 1: lot closer, and maybe she avoided a complete thrashing that
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  Speaker 1: Biden would have suffered. But Democrats are now looking back
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  Speaker 1: thinking maybe they should have held a primary process to
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  Speaker 1: find a different candidate. So was Harris the wrong candidate?
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  Speaker 5: I think there are a whole range of mistakes that
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  Speaker 5: the Democrats made. There were big, overarching mistakes to smaller mistakes.
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  Speaker 5: In terms of Harris herself, she didn't sufficiently differentiate herself
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  Speaker 5: from Joe Biden. That was always a problem for her.
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  Speaker 5: The campaign was too short, There wasn't enough time for
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  Speaker 5: her to explain who she was to people. I think
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  Speaker 5: the problem for her was there was no primary process.
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  Speaker 5: She didn't have her feet held to the fire. And
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  Speaker 5: it was a consistent theme that I picked up from
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  Speaker 5: a voters on the ground. They felt that what happened
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  Speaker 5: was undemocratic and that this undermined a lot of the
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  Speaker 5: democratic attack on Donald Trump as a threat to democracy.
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  Speaker 5: They kept saying, well, look at how Kamala Harris was elevated.
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  Speaker 5: There was no primary process. This wasn't a democratic thing.
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  Speaker 5: People were very concerned about that, and I think also
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  Speaker 5: if you do look at the possible contenders. You have
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  Speaker 5: Josh Shapiro, Gavin Newsom, Gretchen Whitmer. I think it's unlikely
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  Speaker 5: if there was a proper primary campaign, that Kamala Harris
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  Speaker 5: would have ended up running being the Democratic candidate. I
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  Speaker 5: don't think she was the strongest person, but she got
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  Speaker 5: the job. I think she was too negative. I think
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  Speaker 5: those are the key problems. I think there are broader
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  Speaker 5: cultural problems that the Democrats will have to come to
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  Speaker 5: terms with, but I think the main problem is people
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  Speaker 5: felt overlooked and they felt safe for going back to
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  Speaker 5: Donald Trump.
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  Speaker 1: Joe Keilly is covering the US election for The Australian.
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: On Friday, we'll be back right here with an episode
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: about Donald Trump two point zero, what we can really
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: expect from his administration and how much of his wild
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: talk will turn into policy. In the meantime, check out
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: all our journalism and analysis at The Australian dot com
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: dot au