Aug 09, 2024 04:00 PM IST
She has energised the Democratic Party after Joe Biden’s non-starter of a re-election bid. However, unfortunately, the US remains deeply divided
It is baffling why the oldest democracy in the world, the United States, has never had a woman leading the government. South Asia is a proud leader in this regard. Sirimavo Bandaranaike became the first woman head of State in the world when she became the Sri Lankan president in 1960. Her daughter, Chandrika Kumaratunga, followed in her footsteps a few decades later. Indira Gandhi, Golda Meir (Israel), Benazir Bhutto (Pakistan), Khaleda Zia, and Sheikh Hasina (Bangladesh) have been other prominent women leaders in government. Several close allies of the US, such as the United Kingdom (Margaret Thatcher, Theresa May, and Liz Truss), Germany (Angela Merkel), and Italy (Giorgia Meloni), have had women in top offices.
So, why not the US? Currently, 13 women serve as governors in that country. In November 2020, Kamala Harris made history by becoming the first woman (of African-Indian descent on top) to become the vice president. Now, with a twist of destiny, she is poised to create another milestone in US history, that is, if she becomes the first woman president. But is the US ready to have a woman president? Can Harris achieve what Hilary Clinton could not? Who knows? Ninety days is a pretty long time in politics!
Notwithstanding his disastrous performance in the televised debate against Donald Trump on June 27, his gaffes at the NATO Summit on July 11, and mounting pressure from leading Democratic leaders—including the Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer—to drop out of the presidential race on account of his frail health and dismal prospects, president Joe Biden continued asserting that he was the man to beat Donald Trump. However, during his isolation at his residence in Delaware due to Covid-19, he might have mulled over the situation dispassionately and realised how his re-election bid was pushing the Democratic Party towards defeat. Eventually, the counsel of his family, particularly his wife Jill, won the day, and Biden ended his campaign on July 21. His quick and fulsome endorsement of his vice-president, Harris, was arguably the best decision in the interest of the Democratic Party.
Suddenly, the disheartened party stood unitedly behind Harris. The fact that she has raised several hundred million dollars in campaign funds and over 360,000 volunteers have registered to serve in her campaign says a lot about her appeal. Not surprisingly, she has already received more endorsements from the delegates than required for her formal nomination at the Democratic Party’s Convention in Chicago on August 27. Even her detractors admit that Harris has energised and galvanised the party; it seems battle-ready to take on Trump.
The Trump camp is rattled that his main plank of attack against Biden — the latter’s age, frail health and failing memory — has just disappeared. Ironically, on these parameters, Trump is now at the receiving end. Harris is nearly 19 years younger than him, looks physically fitter and mentally sharper, and is willing to take the fight to his camp. As a former lawyer, she puts her views coherently, laced with quotable lines.
Trump is resorting to boorish language and questioning Harris’s name, her race, and ethnicity. Releasing Harris’s mother’s picture in a saree and claiming that she became Black only recently, having flaunted her Indian lineage all along, hasn’t endeared Trump to many Americans. His fear-mongering about Harris’s presidency — unfettered entry of immigrants, shortage of jobs, rise in inflammation, an inevitable collapse of the economy given the agenda of the “Looney Left”, rise in taxes, and her inability to counter China — might have sailed with his diehard supporters, but have been mocked by knowledgeable experts. He has stooped lower by asking his Christian and Jewish voters how they could possibly vote for Harris.
Harris stands for universal health care, abortion rights and unions, which endear her to millions of young Americans. By her belief and upbringing, she does care for the less fortunate, including the Black and Hispanic communities. And she is proud of her association with dozens of front-rank Black organisations for decades.
Harris has responded to Trump’s racial slur, attacks on her ethnicity and her record, with dignity and a biting one-liner: “They want to take the country backward while we want to take it forward.” The ground is shifting, and Trump is feeling it. Not surprisingly, Trump is unwilling to have an open debate with her.
The American presidential election is not a popularity contest; it is the delegates of an electoral college who decide the fate of candidates. Regrettably, the US today is still a hugely divided society. The ultra-Right, the race supremacists, those who mounted an insurrection on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, and have no regrets for this unprecedented assault on democracy, and those who still oppose gun control and want a virtual ban on immigrants aren’t ready to accept a woman as the president, and certainly not Harris. She isn’t the choice of the majority of White, male Americans.
Harris must win the Blue Wall states (Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania), and make a dent in the Sun Belt (Arizona, Georgia and North Carolina).
Surendra Kumar is former ambassador to Libya, Mozambique, Democratic Republic of Congo and Eritrea, and former high commissioner to Kenya, Swaziland, and Malta. The views expressed are personal
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