What went wrong with Harris? Experts weigh in

ECONOMY, immigration, power: As the dust begins to settle on the brutal US election campaign, experts have highlighted key obstacles that contributed to why Kamala Harris failed to stop Donald Trump from retaking the White House.

Economic malaise

Democratic strategist James Carville famously explained Bill Clinton’s 1992 victory with the phrase “The economy, stupid!”

Thirty years later, that maxim has been proven true: Vice President Harris has failed to win over American voters who suffered from soaring inflation during her time in the White House with Joe Biden.

The Democrats’ big losses follow similar setbacks for incumbent parties around the world during the wave of inflation in the post-pandemic era.

Although U.S. economic data has steadily improved in recent months, polls continued to show widespread negative sentiment among voters, and Trump relentlessly criticized Harris on the campaign trail over higher food and gasoline prices.

“People still (see) inflation as a problem because they don’t think in annual terms, as economists do, but in terms of the price level,” said Bernard Jaros of Oxford Economics.

“People may be upset by the fact that essential items take up a much larger share of their household budget,” he told AFP.

Immigration wave

As in his disappointment in 2016, immigration was “clearly a factor” in Trump’s 2024 victory, said University of Richmond Law School professor Carl Tobias.

This time, Trump has also promised to launch a massive operation to deport millions of immigrants who came to the US under the Biden-Harris administration.

The number of illegal border crossings has fallen sharply in recent months after Biden issued a tough order, but that comes after record numbers of border crossings last year that Trump and other Republicans have denounced as an “invasion.”

Harris, whose portfolio included immigration issues in Central America, argued that Trump used his influence with elected Republicans to kill a bipartisan border bill for political gain.

Republicans argued that the border bill was too little, too late.

Voters ultimately sided with the Trump camp.

Demographic shifts

Preliminary exit polling showed Harris winning about 40 percent of white voters, more than 80 percent of Black voters and about half of both Latinos and Asians.

While Trump did not win a majority in any nonwhite group, the same polls showed his support among African Americans up by single digits and among Latinos jumping by double digits, a deeply troubling trend for Democrats.

“We’ve definitely seen among Mexican-Americans, evangelicals, working-class people without college degrees… a steady movement toward Trump,” said USC Annenberg professor Roberto Suro.

The trend can also be seen “geographically along the border and in places where this new migration has had a direct impact,” he added.

Contrary to all expectations, Trump has done better than in 2020 with women (despite abortion rights being a key campaign issue) and among young people.

Late entry

Biden, who would have turned 82 on Inauguration Day, caused concern among many Democrats last year when he announced his decision to seek re-election.

But no major rivals dared challenge him for the party’s nomination, and any mention of his possible mental or physical decline was met with denial by the White House.

But a disastrous debate against Trump in June sparked a crisis as concerns about his mental acuity simmered and intense partisan pressure ultimately led Biden to resign.

Harris quickly won the mantle but has just three months left to resume his final campaign.

“Much of this Democratic disaster can be laid on the shoulders of Joe Biden. He should never have tried to run for re-election at age 80, and ultimately left Harris to run a short replacement campaign that proved inadequate,” said Larry Sabato, a political scientist at the University of Virginia.

Biden’s luggage

Harris has struggled to distinguish herself from Biden and his unpopularity.

The Vice President was trapped on October 8 when the ABC talk show host View asked what she would do differently than Biden. After a moment’s hesitation, she said, “Nothing comes to mind.”

The exchange was “catastrophic” for the Democratic nominee, David Axelrod, a former adviser to Barack Obama, said on CNN Wednesday.

Trump, who complained that it would be easier to run against Biden, jumped at the chance, showing the clip at his rallies and highlighting it in many television ads. AFP