Riley might be my favorite WSJ columnist. He's never written a poorly thought-out story. Nails it again.
Trump Allows Harris a Second Chance at a First Impression
The former president needs to get over himself and focus on attacking the administration’s record.
By Jason L. Riley
Aug. 13, 2024 5:09 pm ET
Democratic presidential nominee and Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at a campaign rally in Las Vegas, Aug. 10. Photo: Julia Nikhinson/Associated Press
President Biden was nudged off the top of the ticket last month because he was struggling in the polls, Democrats were unenthusiastic about his candidacy, and donors were becoming restive. Replacing him so late in the race with Vice President Kamala Harris was a risky move, though so far it’s paying off in spades.
Polls show the race tightening and Ms. Harris pulling ahead in several battleground states. Her campaign hauled in $310 million in July—more than double the $139 million the Trump campaign raised. Ms. Harris’s 2020 presidential candidacy went nowhere. She and other Biden rivals were passed over as too left-wing. But Donald Trump has given Ms. Harris a second chance to make a first impression.
Mr. Trump doesn’t seem to grasp that Ms. Harris isn’t Mr. Biden, an octogenarian in obvious physical and cognitive decline. Nor is she Hillary Clinton, who was deeply unpopular when Mr. Trump defeated her in 2016. Ugly personal attacks on Ms. Harris will thrill the MAGA right but few others. And trying to make an issue of her ethnic background is silly. Ms. Harris has identified as black for far longer than Mr. Trump has identified as a Republican.
Mr. Trump is likely to lose a contest that pits his character against the vice president’s. He would do better to contrast his administration’s record to the current one’s. Remind voters that before the pandemic the country was experiencing low inflation, solid economic growth and strong wage gains for the working class. Following the Trump tax cuts, U.S. companies returned profits that had been held overseas, poverty rates declined, and racial gaps in unemployment and earnings shrank.
Under Mr. Biden, living expenses have risen sharply. The prices of groceries and gasoline remain above pre-pandemic levels. The interest rate on a 30-year fixed mortgage is more than twice what it was in 2021, and the median price of a home has risen by nearly 40%. The southern border has seen record levels of illegal entries as border patrol officers have been turned into pencil pushers and are instructed to process fake asylum claims. Wars in Gaza and Ukraine have made U.S. allies less safe, and U.S. adversaries such as Iran and China are now more confident and threatening. A Trump campaign focused on forcing Ms. Harris to answer for this record would be difficult to defeat. But focusing on anything other than his personal grievances has never been the former president’s strong suit.
This is why it’s no shock that Mr. Trump continues to waste precious days between now and November fulminating about the “stolen” 2020 election, giving shout-outs to the Jan. 6 “hostages” who ransacked the U.S. Capitol, and criticizing fellow Republican officials in swing states for being insufficiently loyal. Mr. Trump should be reminding voters why they rejected Ms. Harris four years ago, not reminding them why they rejected him.
Ms. Harris is counting on Mr. Trump’s inability to get over himself. She knows that an issues-based campaign would force her to defend not only the Biden administration’s poor record but also the numerous unpopular stances she took in the past. The vice president has supported a ban on fracking and offshore drilling, two major drivers of U.S. energy security. She has said she would “eliminate” private health insurance and impose a single-payer system run by the government. She has expressed support for abolishing agencies that enforce our immigration laws, endorsed slavery reparations, and backed efforts to defund the police. During the George Floyd protests, her sympathies were with the lawbreakers rather than their victims.
The Harris campaign is trying to walk back some of those positions, but voters deserve to know if that’s due to a change of heart or political expediency. The Trump campaign and its surrogates maintain that Ms. Harris’s surge in the polls is temporary. Perhaps it is, though a temporary bump with fewer than three months until Election Day might be all Democrats need. The political press understandably wants Ms. Harris to give more interviews, but if her media strategy thus far is working, why shouldn’t she continue to hold out as long as possible?
Besides, Republicans know better than to expect mainstream media outlets to ask tough questions of Democratic candidates. The journalists who cover Washington may want more access to Ms. Harris, but they also want Mr. Trump to lose. Count on them to interrogate her accordingly. If the Harris record is to receive the exposure and scrutiny it deserves, Mr. Trump must do it himself and do it consistently. That won’t happen so long as he’s preoccupied with past slights and present character assassination.
Comments