Is Kamala Harris Underrated?

The Ezra Klein Show

New York Times Opinion

Society & Culture, Government, News

4.6 • 11K Ratings

🗓️ 5 July 2024

⏱️ 63 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

If Joe Biden steps aside for the Democratic presidential nomination — still a very big if — the favorite to replace him is Vice President Kamala Harris. In recently leaked post-debate polling from Open Labs, Harris polled better than Biden in matchups against Trump. In 2019, Dana Goodyear wrote in The New Yorker, “As a Black, female law-and-order Democrat, Harris creates a kind of cognitive dissonance.” The profile Harris inhabited then would be welcome in an election year where disorder is on voters’ minds and the Republicans are nominating a convicted felon. But Harris hasn’t inhabited that political profile for years. And since becoming Biden’s vice president the conventional wisdom on her has shifted: She’s gone from rising star — many thought her “the next Obama” — to political underachiever. So I’ve had a few questions about Harris. What accounted for the fast fall from grace after she took the vice presidency? What happened to the smart-on-crime prosecutor we once saw? What has the White House done — or not done — to build her profile? And are critics of Harris fair, or is she underrated now? I’m joined by Elaina Plott Calabro, a staff writer at The Atlantic who traveled with Harris extensively for a major profile last year. I left this conversation with a very different theory of who Harris is, what her politics are and what led to the confusions of her vice presidency. Mentioned: “The Kamala Harris Problem” by Elaina Plott Calabro “Biden Plunges in Swing States in Leaked Post-Debate Poll” by Peter Hamby Smart on Crime by Kamala D. Harris, with Joan O'C. Hamilton · Book Recommendations: Southerners by Marshall Frady The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles The Company She Keeps by Mary McCarthy Thoughts? Guest suggestions? Email us at [email protected]. You can find transcripts (posted midday) and more episodes of “The Ezra Klein Show” at nytimes.com/ezra-klein-podcast. Book recommendations from all our guests are listed at https://www.nytimes.com/article/ezra-klein-show-book-recs. This episode of “The Ezra Klein Show” was produced by Elias Isquith. Fact-checking by Michelle Harris, with Kate Sinclair and Mary Marge Locker. Our senior engineer is Jeff Geld, with additional mixing by Isaac Jones and Aman Sahota. Our senior editor is Claire Gordon. The show’s production team also includes Annie Galvin, Rollin Hu and Kristin Lin. Original music by Isaac Jones. Audience strategy by Kristina Samulewski and Shannon Busta. The executive producer of New York Times Opinion Audio is Annie-Rose Strasser. Special thanks to Carole Sabouraud.

Transcript

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0:00.0	From New York Times opinion, this is the Ezra Klein Show. If Joe Biden steps aside, which is still a very big if, the favor to replace him is Vice President
0:30.0	Kamala Harris.
0:31.7	She is quite literally next in line. There are reasons that are obvious
0:36.1	for this and reasons that are a little bit more subtle like here's one.
0:40.2	She would make the transfer of money a lot easier. A Harris-led ticket could use all the money that the Biden-Hairs campaign is raised,
0:46.6	whereas because of how campaign finance law works,
0:49.6	if anyone else is a Democratic nominee,
0:52.4	that money has to be transferred to the DNC. If anyone else is a Democratic nominee,
0:52.6	that money has to be transferred to the DNC or to a PAC,
0:56.8	which would make coordination a whole lot harder.
1:00.2	But there's been this longstanding belief
1:01.9	in Democratic circles that Harris is a lot weaker than Joe Biden, that he can win the election and she can't.
1:08.0	The big evidence for this used to be that she polled beneath him.
1:11.0	That's no longer true. I was looking at the 538 polling averages
1:14.8	and she has a very slightly higher approval rating
1:17.4	and a significantly lower disapproval rating.
1:20.1	There was a new CNN poll.
1:21.8	It found Biden losing to Trump by six points, Harris losing by only two points.
1:26.0	Other internal Democratic polling has been leaked including by a group called Open Labs.
1:30.0	Looks there too like Harris is now, outperforming Biden against Donald Trump.
1:34.3	In polls before now she's performed similarly sometimes a point of two worse.
1:39.3	So far the conventional wisdom has held that Biden may be weak but Harris is also too weak. But why?
	...

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