Dems Hope Harris Dodges Specifics, Rides ‘Wave Of Enthusiasm’ As Long As Possible

Some Democratic officials and strategists are hoping Vice President Kamala Harris can continue avoiding specifics about her policy preferences and harness Democrats’ newfound enthusiasm to propel her into the presidency.

Harris has endorsed very few specific policy positions and has not engaged in an extended interview since becoming the de facto Democratic presidential nominee in July, but she has nevertheless surged in national and swing state polling. While Republicans have criticized Harris for not offering particulars to the electorate, Democratic analysts and pollsters told the Daily Caller News foundation that they hope to see Harris keep it up while she rides a groundswell of enthusiasm toward Election Day.

“I think it’s a great strategy, and it’s thrown Trump off his game. It’s like a rope-a-dope, like a Muhammad Ali fight: Lay on the ropes and let and let your opponent swing all the way until he falls, until he’s tired and starts making mistakes. And we see that now, that Trump was prepared and had a game plan against Biden — now, he’s the old man in the race, and everybody’s looking at him, and they’re looking at his speeches, his interviews, et cetera,” Adolph Mongo, a Democratic strategist based in Michigan, told the DCNF.

“Listen, Trump didn’t even get into debating any of his Republican opponents in the primary, a great strategy that has now been used on him,” Mongo continued. “Now, if she can stay on the ropes and take all what Trump throws at her, I think she’s gonna be good, and then you come out in the last month or so swinging.”

One of the few specific ideas that Harris has explicitly endorsed to date is eliminating taxes on tips — a proposal that former President Donald Trump rolled out first. Harris and her team have walked back her past support for abolishing private health insurance and banning fracking, for example, and a national security adviser had to clarify that she is not in favor of placing an arms embargo against Israel after Harris reportedly told pro-Palestinian activists that she would be open to discussing restricting weapons transfers to America’s closest Middle Eastern ally.

But so far, the campaign has not explained a vision for how Harris would govern if elected president.

While Harris has held numerous rallies since President Joe Biden dropped out of the 2024 race and endorsed her upstart candidacy, she has not participated in any extended interviews or press conferences. However, Harris’ focus is better spent on establishing her broader, values-based appeal to the electorate at this point in the race than it is on establishing more specific details about her governing vision, according to Dheeraj Chand, a Democratic data strategist who has done previous polling work but is not involved in electoral efforts this cycle.

“If you are on a date with a woman and it’s your third date, you’re not being deliberately ambiguous about whether you’re going to get married in a cathedral or in City Hall — the issue has just not come up yet,” Chand told the DCNF. “There are thousands of position papers being released every day. It is not the job of a political candidate to do that. What her job is right now is to establish to the Democratic voters and to the voters of America who she is, why she was chosen by Biden, and why she is ready to run and lead a little earlier than planned. So, yes, this is brilliant, and it’s working.”

Indicators that the Harris campaign’s approach has been successful to date include increasing requests for yard signs and volunteer shifts, well-attended rallies and especially surging donations, Chand added.

Some Democrats on Capitol Hill are reportedly thinking along similar lines, finding that the enthusiasm for Harris could end up being a more potent electoral force than policy particulars with less than 100 days to go to Election Day, according to Politico.

“Why would we start talking about policy? … We’re actually better off just running on this real wave of enthusiasm and energy. … It’s the best thing [Harris] can do,” an anonymous Democratic lawmaker told Politico.

“Values unite and specific policies divide, so I don’t think there is a desire to spend the next 80 days litigating Medicare for All, for example,” a senior Democratic congressional aide told Politico.

While the Harris campaign may be well-served by waiting to divulge specifics, the electorate is not and it is incumbent upon the legacy media in particular to hold the vice president and her opponent to a higher standard, Len Foxwell, a Democratic consultant, told the DCNF.

“I believe that we are now in the midst of an extended honeymoon phase of her campaign rollout. If she can extend that honeymoon phase to the greatest extent possible, and the legacy media allows her to do it, then it absolutely works in her best interests,” Foxwell said. “I think her strategic and tactical goals are to shorten this campaign to the greatest extent possible, right?”

“You can look back to elections in cycles gone by, in which there was substantive analysis of the respective campaigns and where they differ on issues like the economy, the role of the United States in maintaining global peace, the limits of government intervention in healthcare and so forth,” Foxwell continued. “I generally believe that a better informed electorate is essential to a more robust democracy, and I honestly don’t believe that we’re getting that right now from the press corps in the 2024 campaign.”

The Harris campaign did not respond immediately to a request for comment.