8mo ago

Opinion | Kamala Harris’ campaign didn’t ignore working class voters

www.msnbc.com

Summary

Following the Democrats’ recent election losses, some, including Senator Bernie Sanders, argue that the party failed by “abandoning” the working class.

However, critics counter that Democrats under Biden implemented one of the most pro-working class agendas in decades, passing union-supportive policies, job-creating infrastructure bills, and increasing wages.

Despite these efforts, Democrats saw little electoral benefit, especially among nonwhite working-class voters, as cultural grievances took precedence for many working-class voters.

Analysts suggest that the party’s best path forward may be to focus on college-educated suburban voters rather than attempting to win back working-class Republicans.

46 comments

They had been telling us nonstop from day one that we are not struggling, that everything's okay, that the economy is strong and And unemployment is low, which means nothing if people are not getting paid a livable wage. They Ignored our cries for help that we are struggling. We cannot afford food, we cannot afford rent, our wages are stagnant. Time and again they kept repeating the same lie, everything is okay, you are not struggling.
That is blatantly ignoring the working class.
- I watched these too. But I didn't walk away with the same conclusion. I walked away with the economy is headed in the right direction. And they know people are struggling. Which is arguably true. Inflation was reducing and wages were going up. That's been happening for the last two years.
- Can you show an example where either Biden or Harris said Americans aren't struggling?
  
  During the Biden debate. Moderator asked Biden a question along the lines of, "what do you say to the millions of Americans struggling with high prices in this economy?"
  Biden said, "No the economy is doing fine," and dismissed the fact that Americans are struggling.
  Edit: I'm not sure where I heard this from. I could find it in the transcript either and I don't care enough to search where I heard him say it. It was a long political race and I'm tired.
  
  Everyday, ad nauseam, the White House press Secretary repeats the lie that Americans are not struggling and the economy is good. She is the direct mouthpiece for the White House for the president.
  
  Why is this comment getting downvoted so much? Asking someone for evidence to support what they're saying doesn't seem unreasonable to me.
Analysts suggest that the party’s best path forward may be to focus on college-educated suburban voters rather than attempting to win back working-class Republicans.
fuck no
- i'm already done with this. we are in for the final fucking mile.
- There are plenty of working class democrats they abandoned.
  
  yes! but we're still here. i am bad at this. I encourage concepts like mutual aid.
I respectfully disagree. there was no real, tangible results for most working class adults. Inflation was still terrible and there seemed to be no relief from it. not many real progressive measures were enacted that people actually wanted or noticed. industries all around were still slowly shutting down and quite a few factory towns suffered badly during their term. they could have done something about it proactively, but chose to brush it under the rug. it's awful, and I didn't want this outcome but you gotta understand that most people want cheaper stuff and not be jobless.
it really goes to show how far people will go if they think their livelihood is at risk. they'd go as far as electing a Nazi. crazy isn't it?
- Democrats under Biden implemented one of the most pro-working class agendas in decades,
  there was no real, tangible results for most working class adults.
  Both things can be true.
  
  When the bar is just that low literally anything can be the most in decades.
They failed to predict voter sentiment so obviously they're right about the voters being at fault.
- Reminds me of Clinton’s vaunted “Blue Wall” that totally collapsed. Harris expected Democrats to show up without campaigning to them and were shocked when they didn’t.
A red flag for me, from an outside perspective, was how the #MastodonforHarris campaign was dealt with.
A completely grassroots organization led by ordinary Americans who care about democracy get together and collect hundreds of thousands for the campaign. Some are relatively well-connected and attempt to reach out. And, as far as I could see, the campaign couldn't even be arsed to issue an official "thank you".
If this is how far removed the campaign was from ordinary Americans, who in the world had any access? Who would feel like their voice is being heard, if fundraising half a million is not even enough to be recognized with a thank you from some low-ranking representative?
I'm not American, and I have no idea what the situation is like on the ground over there. I kind of hoped/assumed they put in their effort being available to steel workers in Pennsylvania rather than nerds on Mastodon. But seeing how it all went down I guess they were equally far removed from everyone.
- If this is how far removed the campaign was from ordinary Americans, who in the world had any access?
  The Cheneys.
  
  I'll never get over that
Progressives need to start their own party. This coalition with the DNC is ridiculous and just keeps getting worse all the time.
You can't say she had no desire to court working class voters, and be upset that she was campaigning in Texas and with Liz Cheney.
- Why not? What the fuck did Liz Cheney ever do for the working class?
Biden/Harris: [Works to help working class]
Working Class: [Doesn't listen / pay attention]
Working Class: WhY ArE yoU igNOrinG us??
- Her messaging still sucked.
  It was this. I was really engaged this season. I was fully on board to support her, but towards the end, I had to remind myself why I was excited. I was already going to support her, and I had forgotten what made me excited more than once.
  If that happened to me, a fervent supporter of what she represented, everybody else who was more lukewarm forgot completely. She was the candidate of change at the beginning and was Joe Biden 2.0 by the end.
  If Dems don't figure out how to capture excitement in their next attempts, if they can't energize the young who are so naive they follow Instagram influencers without a second thought, they're gonna keep losing to these terrible but charismatic Republicans.
  
  Not really. She did talk about policy but media only ever highlighted her few minutes rightfully calling trump a fascist.
  Not really her fault that media wants ratings and clicks instead of doing their job as the fourth estate.
  
  If Kamala would have spent half the time she spent talking about Trump, talking about corporate price gouging instead and how she would go after corporations like a bulldog, voters would have had a place to look for blame other than the Democrats.
  I agree. It was really frustrating that she wasn't hammering this home. BUT I still don't think that it would have really moved the needle that much. Same with Palestine. Same with Biden dropping out earlier. Same with being a bit fuzzy on details. So on and so forth.
  In the end, the American people wanted Trump the person. He has no economic messaging besides a nebulous idea of "fixing" the economy through tariffs, which is laughable. People who use the economic anxiety argument are either trying to deflect blame from themselves for voting for him ("I don't like him as a person, but he has good policies.") or because they want to believe in the fundamental goodness of their fellow Americans so that their choices can be rationally explained. The former is deluding themselves since Trump has no cogent economic policy. As for the latter, I get why they want to believe that, but the truth is a lot uglier. The majority of Americans either affirmatively approve of or tacitly tolerate Trump's authoritarian tendencies and/or are simply too uneducated (or just plainly stupid) or (if I'm being extremely charitable) woefully misinformed or uninformed to understand the gravity of his election.
  I'm tempted to blame the Democratic party and nitpick, but at the end of the day, Harris ran a good campaign. It wasn't perfect, but even if it were, we'd still more or less be here. The core problem, I think, lies in our culture and our educational system. Trump was a uniquely awful candidate, and Harris was a competent, "standard" politician. By all measures, she should have won. Even still, the American public repudiated her, which is simply irrational. In the end, it comes down Trump being the symptom not the problem. The problem lies in our culture and society.
  tl;dr: Even if Harris did message better, she still would have lost. American culture and society is flawed and ultimately at fault.
  
  Perception isn’t reality, but it’s just as important. You have to do great things for the working class, and then tell them, with examples, both how you helped and how the Republicans would have screwed them. Repeatedly. No room for kid gloves.
  
  More blame shifting, and I will not accept it. We all knew what was at stake, and we let it happen.
  Again, we failed.
- Biden/Harris: [drops the bare minimum of crumbs from the table without pursuing any enduring change]
  Harris campaign: [runs as far and as fast as possible to the right, abandoning policies to help the working class Harris campaigned on in 2020]
  people that have no clue what they're talking about: tHe wORkiNg cLasS wAs DOiNG gREat aCTuaLlY
- Or Biden/Harris didn't works to help working class, or at least not hard enough.

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