At the end of a major political loss, in India as in America, the search begins for a scapegoat. By any reckoning, the 2024 US election is a disaster for the Democrats. They have lost the presidency – and likely the popular vote along with the electoral college – as well as both Houses of the legislature.
Who is to blame? Joe Biden, for staying around too long? Kamala Harris, who was unable – despite huge financial backing and her party rallying behind her – to repeat the 2020 performance? Or is it, as so many are already lamenting, the American people, whose latent misogyny has led them, twice, to pass over a qualified woman for President? Even without the granular details of the election results, it is clear that the “basket of deplorables” argument is an eyewash. Those who voted for Biden in 2020, especially in the swing states, did not do so for Harris. And calling voters names makes for neither good strategy nor robust analysis.
Beyond the current moment, and beyond the US, there are lessons from Harris’s loss – and Trump’s victory. At the heart of these is the fact that voters — especially the “undecided” middle that determines poll outcomes — are drawn more to authenticity and clarity (even if it seems rude and revanchist) than virtue signalling. The latter makes the hypocrisies that are inevitable for those in government look all the more stark.
The Democratic Party’s challenge is one that the post Thatcher-Reagan centre-left has grappled with for nearly three decades now. In the US, this is exacerbated by the two-party system: How can a political formation that counts among its base billionaire Michael Bloomberg and the Palestinian-American who is wondering if her family is alive amidst the bodies in the rubble in Gaza speak to both? How can it reconcile the base of working-class men and women, many of whom are socially and religiously conservative, with the radical gender politics of the university campus?
In multi-party democracies, these disparate constituencies would have their own parties and allegiances. This is, in one sense, a natural part of democratic deepening. In India, for example, as diverse identities started asserting themselves, the Congress Party’s “umbrella” shrank, and parties such as the RJD and SP, and Congress off-shoots such as the TMC and YSRCP, emerged.
The fact is that right-wing parties have managed to build broader social coalitions across democracies. Trump has had growing support from Black and Latino voters, and has won in places where he had a poor showing in both 2016 and 2020. His speeches are rambling, yes, but the campaign has focussed on issues. He has, for example, consistently spoken to those who have lost out or are precariously employed in traditional manufacturing sectors. Even on abortion – the overturning of Roe v Wade arguably led to the Republicans’ poor showing in the 2022 mid-term legislative elections – he has softened his stance. Minorities and migrants, it is clear, are not for open borders in the US. And finally, he has successfully painted himself as the victim of a witch hunt and the cases against him as part of a political vendetta.
Weaving all these strands together is a grand narrative: Globalisation, wokeism and, ironically, unregulated capitalism, have eroded American jobs, ways of life and even identities as fundamental as gender. The Trump camp also realised that race is not the lightening rod that it used to be.
The Harris camp, on the other hand, bought into the TikTok-ification of political grammar and in doing so, lost the vocabulary to address fundamental issues.
First, the refusal – or worse, inability – to control the mass killing in Gaza and the expansion of the conflict was a stain on the Biden administration and a political liability. Two crucial constituencies – college students and Muslim Americans – were alienated by this. Harris refused to distance herself from these policies and failures. Dearborn is one of the largest Arab-American cities. It is in Michigan (a swing state). It saw only 39.6 per cent of the vote cast – a NOTA rebuke if ever there was one.
Second, Harris did not set the agenda. Talk of being a gun-owner and hard on crime cut little ice with the Republican base. And tom-tomming the support of Dick and Liz Cheney only made her party seem more elitist.
Third, the unadulterated pro-Democrat bias of a large section of the US media likely hurt the party in the polls. Trump and J D Vance were scrutinised and pilloried. Harris and Tim Walz were only celebrated. As a result, the former were known, for better and worse, while the latter were merely cardboard cut outs speaking in quotes, providing raw material for memes.
Finally, and most importantly, the Harris camp lacked a grand narrative. What does it mean to be a left-liberal in America today? On free speech, the Republicans have the party on the backfoot, successfully making “cancel culture” an issue. The support from Hollywood stars and the likes of Beyonce and Taylor Swift make the Left seem elite – ordinary people do not breathe such rarefied air. Any notion of “protecting freedom” abroad has little value after Gaza and Ukraine – the latter making all the more stark the doublespeak around the former. And Trump, with his talk of tarrifs and Make in America, seems more anti-plutocrat (he is not) than the so-called left.
The seeds of this loss were sown back in 2016, the lessons of which remain unlearnt. Bernie Sanders was on his way to winning the nomination, but did not, thanks to technicalities and “super delegates” in Demcocratic primaries. He was, “too socialist”. But he had the right idea: Universal healthcare, better, cheaper education and an unapologetic acceptance of minorities of every stripe in a broader political community.
Any candidate, man or woman, with that clarity of vision, both left and liberal, would have spoken to a much broader swathe of Americans. Instead, a party that should make room for the outsider became the establishment, despite a candidate with a story that should and could have been sold better. And a billionaire with inherited wealth became the Everyman.
The lesson for other political parties from the Democrats’ failure is this: If you want to be Left-Liberal, be left and liberal. The voter knows how to look beyond celebrities and sound bites.
aakash.joshi@expressindia.com
