Kamala Harris Is No Great Mystery
There are some things we donât know yet about what a Kamala Harris administration would look like. On issues from the economy to foreign affairs, gaps remain in the vice presidentâs policy proposalsâand she has, in some cases, seemed intentionally vague. (Perhaps all the better to maintain a coalition so ideologically broad it somehow includes both Dick Cheney and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.) But the idea that this makes her an unknown quantity is bunk: On the most important matters of this election, we know who Kamala Harris is. And just as importantly, we know exactly who her opponent is, too.
Yet, the notion that Harris is some kind of political question mark seems to be taking root among some critics and undecideds. The Wall Street Journal editorial board branded the vice president a âmysteryâ back in August, accusing her of telling voters âtheyâll have to elect her to find out what she really believesââa charge the paperâs Joseph Sternberg repeated after her debate with Donald Trump this month. More recently, the New York Timesâ Bret Stephensâan anti-Trump conservativeâused his column to describe the âuneaseâ he feels about voting for Harris because of her apparent opacity, which he suggested has contributed to a âwidespread perception of unseriousness.â
âThe problem that a lot of people have with Kamala is we donât know her answer to anything,â Stephens said on Bill Maherâs program Friday, defending his column.
âBut you know his answer to everything,â MSNBCâs Stephanie Ruhle shot back, noting that Harris is ânot running for perfectâsheâs running against Trump.â âI feel like youâre the dog weâre trying to get in the car to go to the vet,â Maher quipped.
Stephensâwho said he is not voting for Trumpâisnât completely wrong on the merits of his argument: Candidates should earn the support they get, and they should articulate a governing agenda. Itâs not unreasonable or unfair to hold candidatesâeven the ones you supportâto a set of expectations.
But Harris isnât exactly a âmystery,â even if her campaign has seemed to focus more on good vibes than on hammering out the details of her agenda: She was a senator for four years and vice president for the last three and a half. And while some of her positions have shifted in that time, they have all been within the normal range of Democratic conventions. That may not specifically answer Stephensâ query, in his column, about what âlimits to American support for Ukraineâ she might have, for instance. But she has made clear that her approach would be based on longstanding United States support for the institutions Trump has shown indifference and oftentimes hostility toward. âWe understand the importance of the greatest military alliance the world has ever known,â Harris said of NATO during her firstâand perhaps onlyâdebate with Trump. That doesnât quite speak to the nuances Stephens is bringing up, of course. But those details canât be addressed unless the U.S. settles the broader questions about democracy, decency, and truth that this election hinges on.
Trumpâwho, it should be noted, is often spared the pesky expectation that his plans be coherent, detailed, or consistentâis running on an authoritarian agenda. His platform depends on the slandering and demonization of immigrants and the promise of âretributionâ against those heâs identified as the enemies of him and his movement. His âpolicies,â to the extent he ever actually talks about them, are a jumble of pie-in-the-sky promises, gut instincts, and contradictory positions mostly meant to provide cover for the program he really cares about: the consolidation of power. That makes the question of what âregulations sheâd like to get rid of in her initiative to build three million new homes in the next four years,â as Stephens posed, somewhat incidental to the more fundamental question of this election: What kind of country are we going to be?
Harrisâs answer to that doesnât seem like much of a mystery. Neither does Trumpâs, despite the bouts of amnesia that apparently wiped some Americansâ memories of his first four years in office and the ambiguity he has tried to foster about what heâd do a second time around. âWe know exactly,â as Ruhle put it to Stephens Friday, âwhat Trump will do, who he is, and the kind of threat he is for democracy.â