With President Joe Biden officially dropping out of the 2024 presidential race, we are in uncharted waters, with less than four months to go until Election Day, no presumptive Democratic nominee chosen through a primary process, and the potential for an open convention in August. But there’s no need for presidential wannabes to participate in a circus that would be sure to fracture the Democratic Party and its exhausted voter base. It’s time to go all in on Vice President Kamala Harris.
Biden himself endorsed Harris shortly after announcing the suspension of his campaign, whereupon she formally announced her candidacy. In the hours since, she has received a flood of endorsements from influential Democrats and elected officials, as well as unions like the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), and the United Farm Workers (UFW). She also, crucially, appears to have landed the coveted Charli XCX endorsement.
When it comes to money, enthusiasm, and support from core Democratic constituencies (hell, even the realities of space and time), it is abundantly clear that Harris needs to be the nominee.
Already, whole slates of delegates from states like New Hampshire, Tennessee, and North Carolina have pledged their votes to Harris. More than half of the delegates needed to win the nomination vote are backing her, according to an Associated Press survey.
She appears to be a money machine, breaking records for presidential donations by pulling in $81 million in the 24 hours since President Biden dropped out. Left-leaning PAC ActBlue raised nearly $47 million in small donor donations across all Democratic races within seven hours of her candidacy being announced. Win With Black Women says they raised $1.5 million for Harris’s campaign during a Zoom fundraising call attended by more than 44,000 participants. If she is indeed the nominee, she will soon have access to the massive Biden-Harris campaign war chest, since the campaign amended their Federal Election Committee filings to her name on Sunday. (She’s the only candidate who could inherit these funds without issue).
There is a real benefit to having Harris at the top of the ticket. As the first Black woman and AAPI woman to lead a ticket, her candidacy as the general nominee would be historic: If elected, she would be the first woman president, the second Black president, and the first president of South Asian descent. (Conversely, Democrats risk alienating Black women voters who they love to champion as the base of the party by picking a candidate other than Harris. Trump has also peeled some Black men voters away from the Biden coalition. It’s not clear if candidate Harris would bring them back, but it’s worth noting that she has been endorsed by Black male-led PAC Alpha PAC.)
When it comes to policy and appealing to younger voters, there is some evidence she will be less willing than her predecessor to aid Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu in his brutal assault on Gaza, although that remains to be seen. (She did call for a ceasefire in Gaza earlier than Biden did). Crucially, Harris is also a much stronger candidate than Biden when it comes to defending abortion rights, which will be one of the Democrats’ main cudgels against the Republicans in the first presidential election post-Roe v. Wade.
This is not to say that Harris is a perfect candidate. Before she became a US senator from California, she served as a prosecutor and attorney general and has a complicated record on criminal justice reform. She came up in politics as a moderate, though her politics are considered to the left of Biden’s, and she supported progressive legislation like health-care reform (she had a Medicare for All plan that somewhat differed from Bernie Sanders’s in 2019) and the Green New Deal. There is also the fact that she wasn’t chosen to be the nominee by voters during the primary process and there are concerns that the GOP may try to challenge her place on state ballots via legal measures, although legal experts say those threats are mostly unfounded.
Yet Harris’s nomination is not yet quite a done deal. Prior to Biden’s drop-out announcement, party leaders seemed reluctant to name her as his likely successor and were floating various alternative possibilities. These included a general open convention — a process in which candidates make their case for the nomination to the convention delegates, who are then free to pledge their support for whomever they find most compelling — as well as a “blitz primary,” a concept outlined in a memo that was reportedly circulating among some Democrats. As Semafor reported, the blitz primary would involve candidates chosen via polling, endorsements, or by senior elected officials, who would then spend a few weeks introducing themselves to the nation via television forums (hosted, in the memo’s dream scenario, by the likes of Mr. Beast and Zendaya), before ultimately heading to the convention for the open delegate vote. Notably, big donor Michael Bloomberg and fundraiser Deval Patrick did not offer an endorsement of Harris. While influential Democrat Nancy Pelosi offered her endorsement on Monday, party leaders Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries did not, opening up some space for others to throw their hats in the ring.
Any of these moves would be a massive mistake. There are only 106 days left until the election, and an open convention process could lead to more fracturing in the Democratic Party. Most of the big names floated as alternative candidates, like Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer, California governor Gavin Newsom, and Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro, have endorsed Harris; even conservative-Dem-turned-Independent senator Joe Manchin denied reports that he would consider running. The last true open convention for the Democrats was in 1968, an event that devolved into chaos, sowed deeper divisions, showcased disarray among Democrats, and ultimately helped Republican Richard Nixon get elected. The Democrats have had enough division in the last few weeks. They don’t need this.
While we didn’t get to vote for Harris to be the nominee in a primary election, 81 million Americans voted for her ticket in 2020. She has injected new energy and enthusiasm into the election, with the Biden/Trump repeat matchup having felt inevitable since the early primaries. And at 59 years old, she has the energy, vitality, and communication chops to take on the 78-year-old Trump, who currently leads in the polls and is considered the favorite to win. He is still, however, a historically polarizing candidate who can fumble the bag at any time. A younger Democratic nominee who can handle a grueling campaign, articulate the dangers of a second Trump term, and take her vision for America’s future across the country may have a much better chance against him.
So, fellow and future coconut heads, please meme with me into the great unknown. It is time to become unburdened by what has been — Biden-Harris — and imagine what can be: Harris-Insert VP Pick 2024. Let’s do this.
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