Kamala Could Have Won - The American Prospect

[justaprogressive]

Kamala Harris was poised to win the 2024 presidential election when her message included America getting control of its border and her championing economic and political change.

In her campaign launch speech addressing the economy and in her DNC acceptance speech, she addressed the cost of living as singularly important, showed empathy, and offered concrete policy solutions. She promised that Congress would enact the bipartisan border control bill. She embraced President Biden’s expanded Child Tax Credit and attacked Donald Trump’s tax cuts for billionaires. Her speeches made the election a battle for the middle class. She was laser-focused on the cost of living, while portraying—correctly, as we are seeing today—Trump tariffs as an inflationary tax on imports. She made that the principal fight of the campaign.

Two books, one by Chris Whipple, Uncharted: How Trump Beat Biden, Harris, and the Odds in the Wildest Campaign in History, and the other by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes, Fight: Inside the Wildest Battle for the White House, show the disastrous decisions that put Donald Trump in the White House. I will also describe my efforts with various participants to impact those decisions.

You need to read both these important books to understand the 2024 election. Harris could have won, but her campaign had so many 180-degree turns and was so burdened by Joe Biden’s continued presence in the campaign that she lost. The lessons for Democrats are painful.

https://prospect.org/culture/books/2025-05-14-kamala-could-have-won-whipple-allen-parnes-review/

Recommended if painful.

[BlueTsunami2018]

1. Could have, should have, would have.....

But did not.

There were so many mistakes made. Does it even matter at this point?

People chose hate and suffering and absurdity and we have to live in this Hell for the gods know how long.

[justaprogressive]

3. "Does it even matter at this point"?

Yes, yes it does.

“With due deference to an esteemed lyrical authority one may safely say that a sorrow’s crown of sorrow is anticipating unhappier things.”

— Saki

[BlueTsunami2018]

17. I am definitely anticipating unhappier things.

We’ve just barely gotten started. I can’t imagine what three plus years more of this is going to bring.

[bdamomma]

33. never

give up on hope.

[Shrek]

8. I would like to hear more about these mistakes

In the aftermath of the election I read posts right here at DU that the campaign was perfect and flawless and could not possibly have been executed any better.

[BlueTsunami2018]

19. I think they've been pretty well documented.

Joe should have made it clear that he was one and done. He did his job, got everything back on track and was handing it over. That was the first mistake.

Second was just giving the nomination to Harris. I understand why given the money and all that but not giving people a choice was a mistake. Particularly when, as I see it, if there was a primary or open convention, she wouldn’t have won the job. We’d probably be talking about President Newsom right now.

And then there was the campaign. I don’t know that it all needs to be rehashed because, as I said, it doesn’t really matter at this point.

[elocs]

24. It matters that we learn from the loss. If we don't, it was all a waste & will happen again. n/t

[brush]

27. So many mistakes made? No. She ran a near flawless campaign in the short time she had.

beat the convict decisively in the debate. The convention was stellar and set a new mold on how to put on a convention. Raise huge amounts of money from many constituency groups.

Lack of time was the mistake, and we get in trouble here talking about that.

[DemocracyWorks]

2. Reporters love their gossip books huh.

[Fiendish Thingy]

4. Anybody could've beat Trump

If Biden had announced he wasn’t running for reelection right after the 2022 midterms.

[DemocracyWorks]

5. Not true

Trump is a unique figure in politics he beat Hillary Clinton in 2016 and almost won in 2020, so no I don’t think anyone could have beaten him like Dem operatives seem to be coping in these articles. I think Dems need to reconcile that too many Americans love his kind of politics.

[Johonny]

6. What if Hitler was a good painter?

I will leave what if to Marvell

[tinrobot]

7. I still think she probably did win.

[krawhitham]

9. She lost because the campaign cared more about getting the Liz Cheney voters than progressive voters

Her polling started slipping after she started doing campaign events with Liz Cheney

[JI7]

16. lol, anyone that didn't vote Harris is not a progressive

It means what Kamala has done and said her entire life didn't matter and that they actually opposed it.

Just like they opposed Liz Cheney being outspoken against Trump.

Those people are trash and show what a joke the progressive label has become.

[betsuni]

35. Absolutely!

[BlueTsunami2018]

20. These so-called progressive voters should have been baked in.

They knew what the stakes were or at least they should have. Instead they decided to be pony people as usual. No long term vision, no patience and many of them have no sense.

If some thousand year war based on mythology and happening thousands of miles away was more important than protecting your own country from fascism , you’re just a dope.

These so-called progressives and leftists were as easily duped by propaganda as the MAGAts. But they smugly consider themselves so much smarter and better.

They’re not.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

42. And many thought they were punishing her for what was going on in Gaza

I wonder how the good citizens of Dearborn MI feel now?

[Sympthsical]

10. The current Democratic consulting class has to go. All of them.

I'm sorry, they're completely out of touch with the average American voter. They're insular, terminally online, and seem to be having nonstop conversations with an entrenched activist class, their friends in media, and one another.

They don't seem to have ever met actual people. I don't know where this insularity begins. Is it the universities they're attending, the jobs they get early in life, the fact their networking webs are all exceedingly incestuous?

It's something, but our messaging just makes choice after choice after choice where I'm often left here thinking, "What on earth are they doing?"

They seem to regard any voters who aren't living on Twitter like Dian Fossey taking tentative steps into the jungle. Voters in the Mist. "What are these strange creatures? Perhaps if we study them, we may learn their ways. We shall explore this once in a NY Magazine article and then never again."

If the Internet tells you a political strategy is a good idea - it's not. It is automatically not. Partisans on social media are part of that insularity, they do not understand voters - they do not want to understand voters - and they will select whatever option appeals most to the narrowest possible band of voters - namely themselves.

It's been at least 15 years of this at this point. Enough. Scrap it, start over.

[Autumn]

11. According to Trump Elon rigged the election. If he hadn't Trump wouldn't be here.

[Andy823]

28. Exactly

trump was always saying he didn't need any more votes, and he didn't. Musk did the dirty work, and got us where we are today. There is no way in this world that trump would put up with Musk if he didn't have some really good dirt on him.

[Autumn]

30. There are two videos where he said Elon rigged the election. I think he did too.

[Lemon Lyman]

41. With the crap that comes out of his mouth

I'm not defending shitler. I just wonder if, when he says about it being rigged or he wouldn't be here, he may be meaning that if 2020 wasn't rigged (it wasn't) he would've served a 2nd term and wouldn't be in office in 2025. I wonder if we're misunderstanding what he's meaning to say. IDK.

Regardless, as much as I loathe sounding like him ("We were cheated out of the win&quot , I still find it hard to believe that he won in 2024. His campaign looked like crap in the closing weeks. Small crowds. Blowing the microphone. Kamala had a lot of energy behind her campaign. Big crowds. Enthusiastic voters. Then there's him winning all the swing states by a small margin. Really? Every single one? Then there's him winning those swing states while other Dem down ballot candidates won.

[Autumn]

43. In one interview before his inaguration he said Musk knows vote-counting computers

better than anybody all those vote counting computers, and we ended up winning Pennsylvania, like, in a landslide.

In another he said had Elon not rigged the election he would not be here today. That was the most recent one I saw.

[TommyT139]

54. Comment 29 has the videos

[videohead5]

12. An outsider might have beaten Trump

But I doubt it. There are three reasons that Trump won. People blamed the Biden/Harris administration for inflation was the number one reason that Harris lost and the second reason was that this country will still not vote for a woman to be president. It's a very sad thing. the third reason to a much lesser degree was immigration.

[Shrek]

14. Demonstrably false

More Americans voted for Hillary Clinton than any other losing presidential candidate in US history.

The Democrat outpaced President-elect Donald Trump by almost 2.9 million votes, with 65,844,954 (48.2%) to his 62,979,879 (46.1%), according to revised and certified final election results from all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

https://www.cnn.com/2016/12/21/politics/donald-trump-hillary-clinton-popular-vote-final-count

[videohead5]

21. But she lost a majority

Of the states. If they could change it to a majority of the people, yes.

[Brainfodder]

13. Still in think might have won camp here.

Something about brags.

[usonian]

15. Strategy? How about voter suppression? It was YUUUUUUGE. (but not clickbait enough)

https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1324&pid=3270

Trump Lost. Vote Suppression Won. By Greg Palast for the Hartmann Report

https://www.gregpalast.com/trump-lost-vote-suppression-won.

Hartmann:
https://hartmannreport.com/p/0ef5118a-d23b-4842-8ebc-da9b578f73fc

Trump lost. That is, if all legal voters were allowed to vote, if all legal ballots were counted, Trump would have lost the states of Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Georgia. Vice-President Kamala Harris would have won the Presidency with 286 electoral votes.

And, if not for the mass purge of voters of color, if not for the mass disqualification of provisional and mail-in ballots, if not for the new mass “vigilante” challenges in swing states, Harris would have gained at least another 3,565,000 votes, topping Trump’s official popular vote tally by 1.2 million.

Stay with me and I’ll give you the means, methods and, most important, the key calculations.

But if you’re expecting a sexy story about Elon Musk messing with vote-counting software from outer space, sorry, you won’t get that here. As in Bush v. Gore in 2000, and in too many other miscarriages of Democracy, this election was determined by good old “vote suppression,” the polite term we use for shafting people of color out of their ballot. We used to call it Jim Crow.

They're not original thinkers. Jim Crow must go.

Besides, the GOP know what buttons to push.

[JI7]

18. No, there is too much misogyny. A woman can probably win

if it was like 2008 where the incumbent party was the Republicans during the economic downturn.

But women are held to far higher standards. Even some people that regularly vote democratic mostly including for women at lower levels will be reluctant when it came to the top job.

The complaints about her were things like her laugh .

[ananda]

22. So we're blaming Democrats again instead of...

blaming the Republicans who stole it, and the
billionaires who helped them?

[elocs]

25. I expect more from Democrats, I expect Republicans & Magas to be what they are. n/t

[SocialDemocrat61]

34. So in other words, a double standard

[Melon]

50. Looking outside of the organization for scapegoats while

Overlooking our own failures is a failure. Harris was not the best candidate by any means. She wasn’t even. the best candidate for VP when she was chosen and had already been past over by the voting public. We have future learnings to run our best choice in elections not the convenient choice. And stop putting candidates back on ballots that have proven they can’t win.

[SocialDemocrat61]

56. Not looking for scapegoats

It’s holding democrats and republicans to the same standards. Not a high standard for democrats but no standard for republicans. Too bad some rather blame democrats for everything and republicans for nothing.

[elocs]

23. Harris needed all Democrats & independents who usually vote Democratic to get out & vote.

They didn't. Too many Democrats were complacent and overconfident.

[Ponietz]

57. Yes! 90 million non voters

Ignorance and apathy.

[NoMoreRepugs]

26. Opinions, not facts. Time to move on.

[Clouds Passing]

29. Kamala did win. Cheato admitted three times to cheating to "win" the election.

https://www.c-span.org/clip/public-affairs-event/user-clip-trump-admits-they-rigged-the-election/5150039

?feature=shared

?feature=shared

[Self Esteem]

32. Do you think Josh Shapiro was in on it?

Maybe he wanted her to lose so that he could run in 2028 knowing that if she won in 2024, she'd be the incumbent and likely nominee in 2028.

He was the governor of Pennsylvania after all - surely he would have some knowledge of their multiple different systems being hacked somehow...

[Clouds Passing]

37. Dump said it 3 times publicly. I'm just reposting what he said.

[Self Esteem]

39. And I'm asking if you think Shapiro was in on it?

[Clouds Passing]

44. I doubt it.

[Autumn]

59. Is Josh Shapiro an expert in computers and sofware? Eloons DODGE boy toys

are hackers and computer experts, specifically software engineers.

[Kaleva]

36. For that to be possible, Democrats would have to been involved

Like in Michigan

[Clouds Passing]

38. Dump said it three times publicly. I just reposted what he said.

[Kaleva]

40. You think he's honest?

[Clouds Passing]

45. He loves to brag when he does bad things.

[Jack Valentino]

47. Why continue to post the words of a known pathological liar,

particularly on this Democratic site?


Don't worry, the maggots will take up the slack on THEIR sites...

[Clouds Passing]

58. Narcissists love to brag when they think they've won, especially when they've cheated.

[questionseverything]

53. No democrats wouldn't have to be involved

They just have to be so enthralled with the non transparent system they don’t think “looking” is necessary

[Kaleva]

60. How would Trump know ahead of time that no DEM would bother "looking"?

[questionseverything]

62. Al gore was the last democratic presidential candidate to call for hand counted paper ballots

As we know the supremes didn’t allow him to finish the count

[Kaleva]

63. Mi state Repubs conducted an investigation of the 2020 vote

They didn’t find anything amiss but no court stopped them either

[fujiyamasan]

31. When asked what she or the administration should have done differently

She replied “nothing”.

That’s when she lost.

Just like Al Gore ran away from a popular incumbent, she didn’t find a way to distance herself from an unpopular sitting president.

That and that “us” and “them” ad. She made a poor choice embracing some absurd policies during the 2020 primaries. That soundbite was gold for Trump.

[valleyrogue]

46. It's all Joe's fault. Bull effing shit.

NO woman will EVER be elected president of the United States. That much is clear. Trump and his hench people deliberately courted the MRA/incel vote. I don't doubt a hell of a lot of tampering with the tabulators and wholesale disenfranchisement were big factors also.

I ain't buying the notion Trump took every single swing state honestly.

[Prairie Gates]

48. Allen and Parnes are right wing hacks writing Trump hagiography

I can't speak for Whipple.

This is kicking while down, at best.

[B.See]

49. Here we go again. For one

the role that right wing voter disenfranchisement, and suppression played is, imo, indisputable. A decade long effort, on their part, to cull the vote and undermine/question its integrity. Or at least that's how long I've been writing of it.

But, imo, from a moral, ETHICAL standpoint, it still shouldn't have been close. Because each party offered clearly distinctive, and different visions of what America should stand for... should embody.

Bottom line, TOO many voters voted out of MALICE... malice founded upon misinformation, mistrust, and/or mean spirited HATE.

Too many CHOSE evil... the darker path, out of revenge, or to make someone else "pay."

Only it is they who may end up paying for their treachery... and paying dearly.

because ... leopards.

#stop blaming Democrats

[Emile]

51. There was no way Trump won every battleground state. Anybody who

orchestrated an insurrection to overthrow our government, is capable of cheating four years later.

[Botany]

52. Reasons why V. P. Harris lost. Musk was into the data & 5 million voters were stopping from voting.

End of story. Trump knew the fix was in.

[doc03]

55. From what I heard from my MAGA neighbors during the campaign, that photo alone

explains why she lost.

[Xolodno]

61. No single one mistake...

...it was several. Almost too many to list.