Over the past week, I have seen multiple posts asking why Vice President Harris isn’t loudly leading some sort of charge against the Trump admin’s dismantling of America, and MAN do we need to put that attitude AWAY. Quick, fast, and in a hurry.
Kamala Harris ran a galvanizing campaign with a fraction of the time to do so. People (including Whitney Cummings on New Years’ Eve) kept trying to gripe about how we “didn’t choose her” (we did, in an election where she was chosen as Vice President). Those complaints came despite an open nomination process where, at and leading up to the Democratic National Convention, anyone could have secured enough votes for the nomination (and every name except Harris’s was thrown around). To me, it was no surprise that Harris was next - yes, she was the Vice President, but she also had the momentum (cue the GIF of Bradley Whitford in the West Wing, whipping votes for his candidate).
I still don’t know if the Democratic Party forced Joe Biden to step down or if he actually did so of his own volition. I still find that whole thing frustrating because even though Biden was starting to show physical signs of aging and maybe even neurological disease (like Parkinson disease or similar), I still don’t buy the dementia claims. But I’m digressing.
Harris ran the campaign of her life, starting from behind. She made so many of us feel something akin to 2008-era hope after months of watching the re-ascendance of Trump despite numerous felony convictions and his utter mishandling of so much in his first term. She was held back by two things.
The first was the fact that despite being the first serious candidate in the 2024 election to actually say the word “ceasefire” and acknowledge the atrocities being done to Palestinians (yes, the words “serious candidate” are a dig against Jill Stein), she could only go that far because America remains institutionally pro-Israel and President Biden, still the American leader, remains an ally to Benjamin Netanyahu despite the genocide he inflicts. Harris was trapped under Biden’s auspices. Despite Tweets upon Tweets about why Harris was talking about campaign goals (”why didn’t she fix these problems already??”) that ignored the fact that 1) they had an opposite Congress and 2) She wasn’t the Goddamned president, Harris pushed the Gaza issue as far as she could while still remaining viable as a candidate - I believe that, as frustrating as it is.
That tempered stance was not enough for single-issue voters. I wish it had been enough, since we knew what the alternative was despite my friends hoping Trump would be an isolationist despite him saying he would let Netanyahu “finish the job.” Being proven correct after the election feels…the opposite of good. I’m not going to insult single-issue voters here, though I won’t deny my frustration.
The second thing holding Kamala Harris back was…again her own party. Harris’s campaign sparked hope for so many of us because it actually felt real. We were finally pointing out how weird MAGA folks are, out loud and openly humorous. Harris and her running mate Tim Walz were bringing the human side to political campaigns and it felt good. And then around the VP debate, something changed. Walz toned down the “weird” rhetoric and stopped calling out JD Vance’s lies in favor of stilted policy statements. People praised the VP debate for its “civility” but that only helped to normalize MAGA’s terrible approach to policy, frustrating so many of us.
So we are here, one month into Trump’s second term as president and just like Thanos telling us he is inevitable (but without Tony Stark exhaustedly gathering the Infinity Stones for a snap heard ‘round the world), we are watching Elon Musk lead the country downward by dismantling every agency that helps keep the lights on (in the name of “efficiency”) while the man in the oval office signs whatever Musk and other cronies put in front of him, ruining the lives of people who voted for him (and those of us who did not).
It is incredibly frustrating to watch and it seems like no one is able to do anything. Despite calling my Democratic Senators to vote against Robert F. Kennedy, Jr, Tulsi Gabbard, Kash Patel, and literally every other terrible candidate Trump has put up for cabinet positions, the Republican majority will not break with Trump despite the impact on their constituents and so his picks get in.
(Aside: The audacity of Trump and other Republicans to blame DEI or affirmative action or race for elevating “undeserving” candidates of color to mess up while he puts up the worst (either in competence or morality) people up for these cabinet jobs is going to remain one of my talking points for a long time.)
Some of our most vocal Congresspeople, like Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, Bernie Sanders, Adam Schiff, and others have been trying to lead by example, which is great - even though the Democratic Party continues to refuse to allow itself to progress beyond the dead center of the political spectrum. Nancy Pelosi using her influence to get Gerry Connolly (a 74-year-old man suffering from esophageal cancer) elected as head of the House Oversight Committee instead of AOC.
It is this aversion to forward movement that leads me back to my original point. Harris and Walz owe us NOTHING. They gave their all. Harris and her husband Doug Emhoff were recently seen grocery shopping together (which absolutely enraged Jesse Watters, much to my delight). They deserve that normalcy, as much as they can get given their lives.
In the aftermath of the election we heard from many Black women who had, like Harris, tried hard to claw our country away from a Republican party who did not even try to hide their fascist leanings. We have benefited so many times from the efforts of Black women only for them to repeatedly get shafted. Harris got that at a national leadership level - despite everything she did for the campaign, America elected Donald Trump. It wasn’t as big of a victory as he tried to make it sound, but it was still a victory for nationalism and against anyone who is not a rich, straight, white man. For any of us to demand she give any more of her time after Election 2024 borders on insulting.
Kamala Harris owes us nothing and deserves her rest. It is up to us now. Keep calling your Senators and Representatives - they need to hear that we want to resist the descent into fascism that Trump promised. The Democratic Party must hoist the anchor that tethers them to our right-wing Overton Window and let the younger, more progressive wing of the party create a more visible difference between the parties so that we can win back the legislative branch in 2026 and actually fight back.
Do not trust anything that Trump’s administration is doing as everyone repeatedly gets screwed over. Try to support more businesses that do not contribute to Trump’s coffers or his $10.7 million golf outings. Support friends and family whose jobs are endangered. Find local groups in your community and help those whose voice Trump’s administration is trying to erase (again - anyone who is not a rich, straight, white man).
And as trite as it sounds, don’t lose hope. But stop bothering VP Harris.
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