{"id":70802,"date":"2024-07-27T06:06:55","date_gmt":"2024-07-27T06:06:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/index.php\/2024\/07\/27\/three-ways-trump-is-trying-to-end-the-harris-honeymoon\/"},"modified":"2024-07-27T06:06:55","modified_gmt":"2024-07-27T06:06:55","slug":"three-ways-trump-is-trying-to-end-the-harris-honeymoon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/three-ways-trump-is-trying-to-end-the-harris-honeymoon\/","title":{"rendered":"Three ways Trump is trying to end the Harris honeymoon"},"content":{"rendered":"

At a moment of unprecedented turbulence in modern American political history, Kamala Harris is having a remarkably smooth ride. It may not last long.<\/p>\n

Tony Fabrizio, Donald Trump\u2019s campaign pollster, calls it a \u201cHarris Honeymoon\u201d \u2013 where a combination of good press and positive energy have combined to give the Democrat a surge of momentum.<\/p>\n

The thing about honeymoons, of course, is that they come to an end. The realities of married life, or in this case the relationship between Ms Harris and the American voting public, has a way of reasserting itself.<\/p>\n

For now, the champagne corks are flying for team Harris and Democrats may be experiencing an unfamiliar emotion \u2013 hope. But Republicans, after initially being caught somewhat flatfooted by Mr Biden\u2019s historic announcement, are redirecting their fire at the new presumptive nominee.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a look at three areas on which their recent attacks have focused \u2013 and some ways Democrats may try to deflect them.<\/p>\n

\n

1. Calling Harris a \u2018radical\u2019 leftist<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n
\n

The travails of Ms Harris\u2019 unsuccessful campaign for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination are well documented. They include a lack of clear messaging, a campaign rife with internal discord and a candidate who was prone to awkward interviews and gaffes.<\/p>\n

Something else happened during the then-senator\u2019s ill-fated presidential bid, however. She \u2013 like many of the candidates in that race \u2013 tacked sharply to the left, to be more in line with Democratic primary voters.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was a lot of pressure on those guys from the activist base,\u201d said Matt Bennett, the executive vice-president for public affairs at Third Way, a centrist Democratic think tank. \u201cWhen you\u2019re competing in a primary, your political priorities are very different than the sprint to the finish in a general election.\u201d<\/p>\n

Over the course of 2019 \u2013 in debates and interviews \u2013 Ms Harris endorsed scrapping private health insurance for a government-run system. She praised policing reform, including redirecting law-enforcement budgets to other priorities. She endorsed decriminalising undocumented entry into the US and entertained abolishing Ice, the immigration and customs enforcement agency. She backed the sweeping Green New Deal environmental legislation and supported a ban on fracking and off-shore drilling.<\/p>\n

Now those positions could come back to haunt her.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

David McCormick, a Republican candidate for Senate in Pennsylvania, was quick to produce a television advertisement hitting on Ms Harris\u2019 2019 positions and tying them to his opponent, Democratic Senator Bob Casey.<\/p>\n

And Trump has released a video titled \u201cMEET SAN FRANCISCO RADICAL KAMALA HARRIS\u201d that includes many of the policies she backed during that time.<\/p>\n

Conservative commentator Matt Walsh called it a \u201cblueprint\u201d for how to attack the vice-president.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe can argue, correctly, that good leaders change their position on policy and they don\u2019t change her principles,\u201d Mr Bennett, the Democratic strategist, said. \u201cNone of her principles have changed.\u201d<\/p>\n

If she doesn\u2019t do that convincingly, she could lose support from independent and undecided voters that will determine the outcome of the election in key swing states.<\/p>\n

\n

2. Tying Harris to Biden\u2019s record<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Polls show the Biden campaign had been floundering for months. His immigration policies were unpopular. Even though inflation has eased and the economy is growing, voters still blamed him for higher prices. His ongoing support for Israel in the Gaza War was sapping his support among young voters.<\/p>\n

Ms Harris, in her role as vice-president, will at least be somewhat tied to the entirety of the current administration\u2019s record \u2013 for better or for worse.<\/p>\n

Republicans are already trying to hang the immigration issue around her neck, labelling her as the administration\u2019s \u201cborder czar\u201d \u2013 an inaccurate but damaging characterisation that was also used by the media. They cite her past statements on immigration and a claim, during an interview in 2022, that the \u201cborder is secure\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cKamala Harris is currently only known as a failed and unpopular vice-president who knifed her boss in the back to secure a nomination she couldn\u2019t earn, but voters are about to learn, it gets worse,\u201d Taylor Budowich, who runs the political action committee affiliated with the Trump campaign, said in a statement touting $32m in upcoming television advertisements targeting the vice-president.<\/p>\n

According to Mr Bennett, Ms Harris won\u2019t be able to fully distance herself from the Biden record, but she might be able to put it in new light for voters, even in the face of Republican attacks.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat she can do is make this about the future in ways that were going to be very difficult for an 81-year-old guy to do,\u201d he says. \u201cShe can argue that Trump wants only to look backward.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

3. Attacking her years as a prosecutor<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n
\n

In the first public rally of her presidential campaign, Ms Harris unveiled a particularly pointed line of attack against the former president. Noting that she had served as a courtroom prosecutor and as California\u2019s attorney general, she said she had faced off against \u201cperpetrators of all kinds\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo hear me when I say I know Donald Trump\u2019s type,\u201d she concluded.<\/p>\n

Craig Varoga, a Democratic campaign consultant and adjunct instructor at American University, calls the vice-president\u2019s law-enforcement background her \u201csuperpower\u201d \u2013 one that she was not fully able to use on the Democratic campaign trail in 2019, when policing reform was a top issue.<\/p>\n

But Trump\u2019s campaign is already showing signs on how they might respond. His campaign manager, Chris LaCivita, made his bones in the Republican Party by taking on another Democratic candidate\u2019s supposed superpower and turning it against him.<\/p>\n

Back in 2004, Democratic nominee John Kerry was touting his record as a decorated Vietnam War veteran as proof that he would be an effective commander-in-chief during the Iraq War. Mr LaCivita spearheaded a series of attack adverts questioning Mr Kerry\u2019s patriotism and heroism, featuring sailors who served with Kerry on a Navy swift boat patrolling the rivers and shorelines in Vietnam.<\/p>\n

It gave rise to the term \u201cSwift-boating\u201d \u2013 which means to disarm a candidate by attacking their perceived strength.<\/p>\n

And it looks like Trump\u2019s campaign is gearing up for attacks on the vice-president\u2019s prosecutorial record.<\/p>\n

On one hand, they are hitting her for being too tough \u2013 particularly on black men for drug crimes \u2013 in an attempt to undermine support from her base. On the other, they are citing instances where Ms Harris either chose not to prosecute or allowed the parole of individuals who went on to commit new crimes.<\/p>\n

Mr Varoga concedes that Democrats botched their response to the Swift-boat attacks in 2004, but he says they\u2019ve learned their lesson and Ms Harris will be ready for the onslaught.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf LaCivita thinks he\u2019s going to fool the entire Democratic establishment again, he can live with that delusion and also lose,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\n

A race to define Harris<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n
\n

In his memo, Mr Fabrizio said that Ms Harris \u201ccan\u2019t change who she is or what she\u2019s done\u201d. He promised that voters will soon view her as Mr Biden\u2019s \u201cpartner and co-pilot\u201d and learn about her \u201cdangerously liberal record\u201d.<\/p>\n

The upcoming advertising onslaught, along with Trump\u2019s public statements and rally attacks, will be the tip of this Republican spear.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Ms Harris and her campaign will work to offer their own definition of who the candidate is and what she stands for.<\/p>\n

One particularly effective way to do this, according to Mr Varoga, is with her selection of a vice-presidential running mate.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the first real decision that a candidate for president makes that\u2019s out there for the public to see,\u201d he said. \u201cThat will go a long way toward people understanding what kind of future she\u2019s going to pursue.\u201d<\/p>\n

If she opts for a more moderate partner, it could make voters more inclined to believe that she will govern from the centre, rather than as the leftist candidate Republicans make her out to be.<\/p>\n

In the weeks ahead, the fight to define Ms Harris \u2013 through her word, through her votes and through her past campaigns \u2013 will go a long way towards determining how the public views her when they head to the ballot box in November.<\/p>\n

It will shape whether the honeymoon ends in heartbreak for Democrats or a union that lasts for the next four years.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

The post Three ways Trump is trying to end the Harris honeymoon<\/a> first appeared on KBC<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

At a moment of unprecedented turbulence in modern American political history, Kamala Harris is having a remarkably smooth ride. It may not last long. Tony Fabrizio, Donald Trump\u2019s campaign pollster, calls it a \u201cHarris Honeymoon\u201d \u2013 where a combination of good press and positive energy have combined to give the Democrat a surge of momentum. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-70802","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","entry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70802","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70802"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70802\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70802"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70802"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70802"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}