Kamala Harris passed on an opportunity to define herself as a moderate when she selected the progressive favorite Tim Walz as her running mate over more moderate options.

But does Harris really need to redefine herself? It’s a question many readers posed in response (sometimes as a critique), and it was mostly unaddressed by the article.

Two weeks ago, the answer seemed like an obvious “yes.” Now? Well, many of those concerns might be two weeks out of date.

When Harris entered the race, she appeared to be a weak candidate by any measure. After all, President Joe Biden’s flagging candidacy survived as long as it did in part because there were doubts about whether she would fare any better. The polls showed Donald Trump leading her in a hypothetical matchup, and a clear majority of voters said they viewed her unfavorably.

Related Story: ABC Says Trump and Harris Have Agreed to Participate in a Presidential Debate ...

Kamala Is ‘Brat’

Seventeen days later, Kamala is “brat.” The donations are flowing. Arenas are packed for her rallies. The groundswell of support isn’t coming from just the Democratic base, either. Her favorability ratings have surged in recent polls, with now almost half of voters saying they have a favorable view of her. She’s taken a narrow lead in the polls against Trump, and she might still be gaining.

How did Harris do it? What’s striking is that she didn’t have to do much. Biden’s decision to drop out, and her entry into the race, instantly electrified the Democratic Party, and she’s ridden an enormous wave of pent-up enthusiasm for a new face and fresh energy.

It’s worth pausing and thinking about all the things she didn’t have to do to pull this off — the kinds of things that desperate campaigns might try, or that might have made it into a “West Wing” episode, like a new policy platform, a new message, a soaring speech or an exhaustive news conference. She’s backed away from earlier left-leaning positions on fracking, the border and Medicare for all, but there hasn’t been the need for a Sister Souljah moment scolding the left to redefine her as a centrist. Instead, she has campaigned as a mainstream Democrat, with the usual Democratic message focused on issues such as abortion and Trump’s criminal conduct.

Related Story: What Polling Shows About Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Harris’ New Running

There’s no risk to Harris in running as a mainstream Democrat. There is risk, however, if she doesn’t clearly define herself in the minds of voters. The good vibes surrounding her debut will eventually fade, and when they do Trump campaign staffers will try to define her if she hasn’t beaten them to the punch. The huge swing in public opinion about Harris over the last few weeks is a reminder that millions of people don’t have firmly held views of her; there’s no guarantee that some won’t swing back.

With Democrats unified and energized again, the Harris campaign’s central task over the next few weeks is to build a durable political image that insulates her from predictable attacks on the border, crime and her earlier, farther-left positions on the issues. The vice-presidential selection was one opportunity; there will be other opportunities as well. Whatever the answer, the campaign will want to give voters something to hang onto once the political winds eventually start to blow the other way.

The Polling Lead

As I briefly mentioned, Harris has caught up to Trump in the polls. She’s pulled narrowly ahead in The New York Times’ average of national polls, and she has often held an even larger lead in most of the (fairly low-quality) polls reported over the last week.

It’s a remarkable turnaround: She trailed by about 5 percentage points in the handful of polls testing her before the Trump-Biden debate. Now, she might be only a few more poll results away from leading by 3 points nationwide, or more.

Related Story: Harris Selects Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as Running Mate

The Washington State Primary

Even in hindsight, there were only a handful of clues that the polls might be poised to badly underestimate Trump and the Republicans in the 2020 election.

One of those clues: the primary in my home state of Washington.

Usually, primaries don’t tell you much about the general election, but Washington has been an exception. It has a top-two primary where all candidates from both parties appear on the same ballot, and the top two vote-getters advance to a one-on-one general election matchup. And since Washington has universal mail voting, the primary tends to have relatively robust turnout. If you add up the votes for all the Democrats and Republicans, the result tends to come reasonably close to the outcome in the general election for the state. That was true in 2020, when Republicans fared surprising well — foreshadowing their ultimate strength nationwide and Trump’s near victory via the Electoral College in November.

The Washington primary was Tuesday, but it will take a few weeks to count all the late-arriving mail ballots. Nonetheless, the initial results looked pretty good for Democrats. We’ll circle back to this in a few weeks.

–

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

By Nate Cohn/Erin Schaff
c.2024 The New York Times Company