Commentary: 6 reasons Kamala Harris has better odds than Clinton against Trump

Almost as quickly as Democrats took a sigh of relief after President Joe Biden ended his reelection campaign, many also started holding their breath.

There was relief because a diminished, doubted 81-year-old candidate stepped aside and endorsed his 59-year-old Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic presidential nominee. After weeks of criticism and calls for the president to pass the torch, Biden was instantly loved and praised for his patriotism and selflessness in dropping out of the race.

But then the panic set in. Will the country elect a woman, let alone a woman of color, as president?

Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by 2.9 million in 2016 but not the Electoral College. Donald Trump claimed three blue wall states in 2016: Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. He lost them to Biden in 2020. Potentially facing a woman again on the ballot in 2024, could Trump win those swaths of the Rust Belt again?

While some voters spiraled into anxiety and what-ifs, a group of Black women got to work. Win With Black Women, founded by strategist Jotaka Eaddy, had a record 40,000 participants on a weekly Sunday Zoom call. Angela Alsobrooks, the Prince George’s County Executive and Democratic Senate candidate, was among the callers. Together, the women raised more than $1.5 million in a few hours.

There were about as many people on that one Sunday call as there were votes lost to Trump in Pennsylvania in 2016. That quick mobilization and turnout are among the reasons Harris, if she’s the nominee, is not a repeat of Clinton in 2016. Here are some other big reasons:

Roe v. Wade was overturned

When the U.S. Supreme Court overturned 50 years of settled law, they sent women to the polls across the country. Urban and suburban voters, Democrats and Republicans alike voted to protect abortion rights in their states, including in ruby-red places like Kansas. It ensured the “red wave” never came to fruition in the 2022 midterms, as voters still angry about the conservative-leaning court’s decision elected Democrats up and down the ballot. Republicans gained a narrow lead in the House, but it was clear that the economy didn’t drive people to the polls more than Roe did.

Harris has spent two years campaigning on this issue across the country. Don’t be surprised if she successfully makes it a galvanizing issue in this general election. Even Republicans aren’t underestimating reproductive rights, with Trump softening his position and trying to mute the issue during the recent Republican National Convention.

Mail-in voting

Clinton lost to Trump partly because she didn’t attract the turnout Barack Obama had in 2012, especially in Philadelphia and Detroit. Democrats seemed to learn from that mistake in 2020. There’s also a mail-in voting option in multiple states now, making it easier to cast a ballot without going to the polls on Election Day, including in battleground Pennsylvania.

Voters know how Trump governs

In 2016, Trump benefited from independents and moderates looking for a change. He was untested in national office and known mainly for his TV celebrity and ability to transform a rally into a reality show. But now voters have seen how he handles foreign and domestic policy, a global pandemic, the transfer of power, legal cases, and more. Unlike 2016, he’ll be running on a record.

Women have grown into a powerful voting bloc

Clinton made history with her candidacy in 2016 as the first woman to serve as the presidential nominee of a major party. Though she lost to Trump in 2016, her movement did not end. Women across the country gained more determination to run for office at all levels of local and federal government, sending a record number of women to Congress in 2018. Two years later, suburban women played a consequential role in sending Biden and Harris to the White House.

Trump is still Trump

The former president had a massive opportunity at the RNC to punctuate his comeback from political pariah to a strong, sympathetic shooting victim. But the 30 minutes he spent on unity was overshadowed by an hour of his not-so-greatest hits. Trump spent a half hour trying to appeal to the moderates and independents he will need to win swing states and an hour throwing red meat to his base. Strategically, it didn’t make sense.

His base has proven they will be with him no matter what. If he’s going to double down on his brand of name-calling, fear-mongering, unsubstantiated claims of a stolen election, and bizarre musings about the “late, great Hannibal Lecter,” he will not attract any more voters than he did in 2020. He will shrink his support, and that will help the Democratic nominee.

No Comey surprise

There’s unlikely to be an October surprise from the FBI director this year. It’s wise to never say never in politics, especially with more than 14 weeks until the general election. Still, it seems improbable that there will be a last-minute move against the Democratic candidate, as we saw with former FBI Director James Comey in 2016. When he described how Clinton and her aides were “extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive, highly classified information,” many Democrats felt he swung the election in Trump’s favor.

_____

Candy Woodall is the opinion editor at The Baltimore Sun. She wants to know how you feel about Kamala Harris as the potential nominee and can be reached at cwoodall@baltsun.com.

_____