There are stories being written now about how it happened, most recently by Michael Scherer and Tyler Pager in the Washington Post, “How Kamala Harris took control of the Democratic Party,” recounting the details, one by one, hour by hour. Not seemingly hour by hour, but in real time. It happened that way, and that fast – the phone calls, the social media posts, the flood of support by state party leaders, the flood of money that poured in without any serious push or organized solicitation.
The Post story describes how Biden’s decision was posted to his social media account. Biden had decided he was going to suspend his campaign on Saturday night, and “slept on it,” according to the Post. He called Vice President Harris early Sunday morning. The story doesn’t lay out in steps what Harris did or exactly whom she called in what order, but in a matter of hours, campaign and White House staff had arrived at the vice president’s house at the Naval Observatory and began making preparations. What the campaign called “the letter” went out on social media at 1:45 p.m. and then, as the Post describes it, “They gave Biden some time alone in the world, but not much. Twenty-seven minutes after that, Biden endorsed Harris on the same account.”
That’s fast. So is what happened afterwards: Harris made 100 calls to party leaders on Sunday; the campaign had to flip 30 social media accounts from saying “Biden” to “Harris.” The Post names all the campaign and White House officials who sprang into action. Harris’ communications director was adamant that the veep appear on television on Monday, so preparations had to be made for that. The Post reported that “for years,” the site KamalaHarris.com had simply redirected to Biden’s website. That had to be changed, but it could only be done by someone with power over that domain, so there was a scramble at the Democratic National Committee to find that person and get the change done.
And we’re still talking about things that happened on Sunday.
Within hours, all 50 state Democratic Party chairs had endorsed Harris. Part of what was happening was a concerted effort close the door on anyone who was thinking of challenging her at the Democratic National Convention in late August, of course, but by Sunday night, that concern had been put to bed — along with exhausted campaign staff and Harris herself.
What happened after that is by now well known: the Zoom call by an independent group of 44,000 Black women that raised $1.4 million in a matter of three hours. Other groups began to form and have Zoom calls of their own – “Moms Demand Action” was one, and “White Dudes for Harris” was another. The money flooded in, heading toward the $200 million that would be raised by the end of the week.
All the behind-the-scenes stories of what went on with party professionals are fascinating, especially when you consider that the party had not made a single public move in any direction other than President Biden until Sunday afternoon.
The Democratic Party may be headquartered in Washington, but the people who vote for Democrats live in every county of the 50 states that vote in presidential elections. It was out there that the real earthquake shook the ground. Looking back over the last week, it was as if the entire party not only exhaled at once but began dancing in the streets. Social media accounts blew up. There was relief that the Dark Three Weeks following the Biden-Trump debate were over, replaced immediately by enthusiasm that the party had Harris standing in the door and ready to go.
There was something special at work in the transfer that took place from Biden to Harris as the party’s nominee. Harris had spent four years in Biden’s shadow, as every vice president must, especially while the president in question is in his first term with a re-election campaign on the horizon. In fact, Harris came under withering criticism for appearing to play such a quiet second fiddle to Biden. She was called “low energy,” her speaking style was criticized and in Republican corners ridiculed.
But when you look back at the last four years, Harris did what any vice president is required to do in any administration: She made the speeches to various groups and gatherings around the country; she attended the requisite meetings; she made the overseas trips that the White House determined were not presidential enough to demand Biden’s presence of President Biden. She was even criticized for some of the trips she made on behalf of the president, most recently when she attended the Munich Security Conference along with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and national security adviser Jake Sullivan. Harris was said to have taken a back seat while the two men in the room came away with the headlines about the expansion of NATO and plans by EU nations to support Ukraine.
In retrospect, however, the “back seat” Kamala Harris took as vice president has served her well after Biden’s sudden departure as a presidential candidate. Harris’ reputation as a “low energy” vice president looks wholly different when you consider that most energy in politics is expressed as ambition. So, when Biden stepped aside and Harris stepped up, she couldn’t be taken to task for having been too ambitious a vice president who was eager to push him out of the way. She wasn’t.
What she was, was ready, and that truth came across in the speed and efficiency with which, in the words of the Washington Post, she “took control of the Democratic Party.” Sure, the party was ready for someone to take control after the Dark Days of Biden’s apparent decline after the Trump debate. That Harris was as prepared as she has shown herself to be surprised a lot of people, and positively delighted Democrats who were ready for a change.
Energy and excitement are where the power is in politics. Period. Stop. Go no further. It’s just plain true. And we got proof of it this week as the Democratic Party was swept up in a tsunami not only of support for Harris, but of people expressing their enthusiasm in phone calls, emails, text messages – all the ways that energy is measured in today’s politics.
I’ll give you just one example. I had coffee with the mayor of my small town in northeast Pennsylvania, Milford, yesterday. He told me that on Saturday, he had mistakenly taken a call from an unknown number he saw on his cell phone, thinking it was probably a solicitation for money from the Democrats. Instead, it was the Harris campaign coordinator for the Pennsylvania counties east of Scranton. He was calling to see if there was anything he could do to help the Harris campaign effort in Milford and Pike County. Mayor Sean Strub told me that in all the years he has spent in Democratic politics, he had never gotten a call like it, from someone who wasn’t just asking for money, but was reaching out to see if there was any way that he could help. Strub agreed to host a pizza dinner for county Democratic leaders and the Harris campaign folks in this region.
That’s the kind of stuff that’s been happening behind the scenes of what’s going on in Washington. Energy and enthusiasm like you wouldn’t believe is focused on the campaign to elect Kamala Harris as our next president. That’s how elections are won.
