What Undecided Voters Think of Kamala Harris (Ep. 6)

We are not going back.

so new vibes here on the wilderness. Our last show was just after the debate. that has now changed the course of history. With just over three months to go in the 2024 election, President Biden withdrew from the race, and Vice President Kamala Harris is now the new presumptive Democratic nominee. Biden dropping out.

this close to the election is a truly shocking development that has no precedent in U.S. history.

But if you've listened to the show for the last few years, you might not have been surprised that it was the persistent, widespread concerns about the president's age that eventually led him to pass the torch. Concerns that didn't originate with the media or pundits or elected officials, but with the voters. Republican and Democratic voters of every age, race, and background, especially people who haven't decided who they're voting for or whether they'll vote at all. This was true of the voters we heard from before the midterms last season. It's been true this season.

And it's why listening to the kind of voters who will decide this election is so valuable and important. Because we can't persuade people without first meeting them where they are and hearing what's on their minds. So that's what we're going to keep doing for the rest of the season. Only now, we'll be focused on what it will take to persuade enough people to make Kamala Harris the next president of the United States. The race is still extremely close, and the VP starts as a bit of an underdog.

Though she's already in a stronger position to defeat Trump than Biden was, especially after the debate. The impressions voters have of her also aren't as hardened as they are with Biden or Trump. And so the race between the Harris campaign and the Trump campaign to define the VP in the last hundred days of the election is on. One person who's been frantically talking to more swing voters than just about anyone over the course of the last week is our friend Sarah Longwell, the Never Trump publisher of The Bulwark and host of the Focus Group podcast. We asked Sarah to come back and talk about what voters think of our new Democratic nominee and what we can all say to persuade the persuadables in our lives to vote for Kamala Harris.

Let's get into it. I'm Jon Favreau. Welcome to the Wilderness.

Sarah, welcome back to the Wilderness.

What was the fear around if Joe Biden dropped out, like we'd have the first female black president. And so what was the resistance to that? Because the campaign was really leaning on this idea that black voters were with him. Then I did a lot of swing voters, because that's who I tend to talk to. A lot of the Trump 2016, to Joe Biden 2020 voters.

And then, since Harris got in, we've also been trying to get as many in as possible. I think we've done four.

And now say they were going back to Trump almost entirely because of Joe Biden's age, something he was not going to be able to change. A little bit of economy thrown in there, but they were just down on Biden. And so now I would say after the debate, it got much, much more catastrophic in the language. And people were mean. They would say things like he's an animatronic waxwork.

They forgot to wind up. They would call him a corpse. They would talk about how desperate they were over the choice. It was like an insurrectionist versus somebody who's not even there. And so I would say there is a level of excitement over this change, even from swing voters who aren't there yet on Kamala.

They're still so happy about it. That's interesting. They're glad that Biden. But, you know, we all got ourselves in trouble. We are the podcasters.

But I really think they meant you. But like we were among the podcasters who were like, he's got to step down. And a lot of it was because of what I was hearing from these voters, who they're the double haters. Right. And Joe Biden had to turn it around with them.

He had to. And when he failed to do it and it just got worse, there was no path. But then let me just talk about the black voters quickly, because I thought the black voters were super interesting in that we were hearing from people that black voters under no circumstances wanted Joe Biden to step down. That's not really what we heard. All the swing voters wanted him to step down.

All of them in the black voting groups. There was a lot of fear about what was coming for Kamala if it was her. And there was some sort of loyalty. But the black voters were just like, I don't know. It feels better to have an old white guy, because if it's Kamala, like they're going to tear her apart.

They're going to be awful to her. And you could see the fear, like how much they were going to feel it when they came for Kamala.

Even President Barack Obama, like he's a man and he. it was horrible, like people's reactions to him winning. It was horrible. And then, as people mentioned already, Hillary Clinton, like if we were going to do a woman, it would have to be a white woman first.

Like. I felt sad that people felt so certain that America would be so against a woman or a black woman. Like. it didn't even seem to be specific to Kamala. It was just about America and what America would and would not accept.

But what's been interesting to me is how I think excitement can be really contagious. Right. People were being dominated by a lot of fear in those weeks. People were so nervous. And you can see now that once it was Kamala and when she showed up, you could just see how, when somebody is showing up.

Right. And they're going on offense. People are like, you know what? I'm ready to rock. I'm ready to rock with you.

And like, I bet, if we go back to those black women groups and ask them again, I bet right now, I bet they're doing calls for Kamala. You know, they're ready to go, because certainly that's, I think, broadly what is happening. I don't know about that specific group. I think they would still probably be like, you know, I'm nervous about how this is going to go. And they're calling her a DEI president.

But I think that instead of the fear that they felt then, now they would feel ready to go on offense with her.

Right. But like this feels good. I think we could do this. And so it's something similar happening now. She, of course, has the added challenge of sexism in addition to latent racism as well.

So that's tougher. What are some other impressions of Kamala Harris been with the swing voters you've spoken to?

And then I never saw her again once she became the vice president. So that creates for them sort of a negative impression. It's not a locked in anti Kamala. It's just a negative impression. And then there's like a step up above that.

that's more committed. that is like she didn't do anything about the border. You know, she was supposed to do X, Y or Z, but has done nothing. Now, I just haven't seen her. I don't know much about her was so pervasive, though, that I think for a long time I was like, look, voters don't like Kamala Harris.

But when we had to sort of face the choice of Biden, stepping down and understanding that, like the idea of an open convention is going to get tough and whatever. And you started thinking about Kamala. And I started listening to the voters almost with. sometimes you put different ears on, you know, because the world changes. And you're like, I want to think really hard about what they're saying about Kamala right now.

And I just thought, actually, there's a lot of upside here. Most people aren't saying they hate her. Most people aren't saying, yeah, she did this or that. that makes them mad. They have this like loose impression out of, mostly out of an absence of something, which means she can reintroduce herself to the country.

She has a chance here to redefine herself with these people, because some people have a committed negative impression. But most people just have like an absent negative impression.

Here's what I would say about the swing voters right now. They're nervous, like they're catching up. They are not terminally online like the rest of us. And so we're moving at the speed of light of things. And they're still being like, whoa, this happened.

Biden stepped down. Kamala, is she going to be the nominee? Like? they're still kind of like, will it be her? You know, they heard so much about open conventions.

But here's the things that I would say. The few things that I'm hearing thematically. One is for people who are negative. I would say one of the most negative things we're hearing is the idea that there wasn't some form of a primary. I was going to ask.

Yeah, there's this sense of like. the donors got to pick and our Democrats picked. And that doesn't feel fair. We've heard that from some people. Then there's we hear a lot more of the.

I don't know her. I don't know that much about her. But I'm going to go find out like. I'm interested to learn. I'd like to know more.

And it's funny. in the groups, they really are still double haters. And so they do still hate Trump. So they're sort of looking for a reason to like her in a way that they weren't before. This is sort of what I mean about new ears and the way that the context changes, where a bunch of people who kind of had this negative impression of her go, OK, show me what you got.

I'm open now. I'm open for business. I'm ready to hear your pitch. And you could hear some of the people say, like, I didn't know that much about her, but I assume she'll be good on abortion. And let me just tell you, the other thing that's happening with the swing voters is it is happening at the same time that the JD Vance stuff is happening and that JD Vance stuff.

It is creating a whole new layer of contrast, especially for women. And so suddenly she's also getting a new look in that context.

Here's what people take away. It's less cat lady and more. I don't think he likes women. I think he's crazy. on abortion.

I think he seems weird. And I'll tell you, we did so many groups in 2022, both for Vance and on Blake Masters. And back then, I remember how much I thought J.D. Vance, the way that people talked about J.D. Vance and the way people talk about Blake Masters was so similar.

They just think they're weird. And J.D. Vance is getting that now, too, where people are like, I don't know, this guy sucks. I just think he's kind of his weird opinions about, oh, and he's extreme on abortion. Like, that's what's bringing you in?

because of the flip flopping on Trump. It's not so much that they care one way or the other, what he said before. It's just that. it's the act of this person must not have any core because he said all these things. It wasn't like.

he said, I don't want to vote for him. He was like, no, he's America's Hitler. Now I'm his vice president. It's a big flip flop. Like for people, that's not like an evolution.

It's just like a really big swing for folks.

If you are in Arizona or if they're an Arizona voter, they say Astronaut Man.

If they're in Michigan, they say Whitmer. And if you're in Arizona, you don't know who Josh Shapiro is, and vice versa on these folks. And so it wasn't that they had, I think the only name actually that ever sort of comes up organically really is Michelle Obama. Like where they put it forward, because she comes up all the time. I swear to God, if Michelle Obama wanted to save democracy right now.

And when people say, like a black woman couldn't win, I'm telling you, Michelle Obama, run in the tables. I hear her name so often. But the people that come up organically, where people do have some name ID, the main things they knew about Whitmer was the kidnapping plot. That did a lot for her with swing voters.

People know who he is. And Pete, people know Pete a little bit. And then they immediately tell you that America would ever vote for a gay candidate. So, like the voters are so funny because they all do armchair punditry when you start asking them about politics. And one of the things they're very clear on is they think that America is a deeply sexist, deeply racist, deeply homophobic place that will not elect.

I happen to think that people are not nearly as racist, sexist and homophobic as the other people's impressions of them are.

So let's talk about their views of now Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, not just Vice President Kamala Harris. A big question has been whether the online youthful enthusiasm for Kamala Harris is reaching beyond a very online audience. You talk to one group of Trump Biden swing voters that suggests. maybe it is. Let's listen.

So we already know how that went. She's quick witted. She's funny. She has a personality. Obviously, being a female, there are people out there that don't want to vote for a female president.

I think those same people are ones that would not vote for Biden either.

Yeah. Well, it's the never go back.

And it's interesting, actually, because it is one of the things that Trump voters say when they want to say how, like, they're not going back to the other Republican Party. But it is a deep psychological interest in moving forward and living a life forward that I think they're tapping into, that voters like. And obviously, Trump is the backward looking. But the main thing is that when they say breath of fresh air. And so they were super, that person was being very positive about Kamala.

And we are hearing positive things from in the focus groups. So, like, let me just go back, because a lot of it is me comparing the focus groups from before to the focus groups we're doing now. So, like I was saying, there was a ton of backsliding. They were filled with double haters. People were mad about their choices.

And now you still get a little bit of backsliding. You still get a bunch of some people being like, well, I think I'm going to vote for Trump because I've been unhappy about the economy or whatever. But they're also saying, but I'm open. Like, tell me more, because they don't love Trump. These ones.

And so we're seeing much less backsliding now. And we're also seeing people who are affirmatively excited. And then we're seeing kind of a middle group. that's like, tell me more. I'm here to be interested.

We do do head to heads, and the head to heads where we basically are like elections tomorrow. I demand you vote for us. And I think it's been like seven to one. And so that is much better than the sort of six to three, four, four that we were seeing a lot of in the sort of three weeks after the debate.

And I can't, I can't say anything. I forgot that she was the vice president for a while. I feel like I don't know her well enough. The positive part is, I assume, for being a woman, she's going to be looking out for women's rights. She's not going to be throwing women under the bus, trying to put us, you know, stuck at home cooking and cleaning.

I don't know. Like, you know, talking about the 2025 project. I'm like, oh, man, that sounds like we're that sudden.

The reason that the blue wall states were we all felt like this is ultimately gettable is because Biden was still doing well with old white people. And in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin and Nebraska, too, there's a lot of old white people. That's the question. The question is like sort of college educated, suburban white people, Kamala with Kelly or Shapiro or she? or give me any of them.

Yeah. Any white boy. Summer, white boy. Summer. Yeah.

Any of them. Fine. I think that it's these older folks who a lot of them like. they just don't like Trump because Trump tried to coup. And that's not what they don't like.

The January 6th. They don't like that. He's a jerk. You know, there's a section of them. I haven't dug in enough to know how much work you have to do to get those voters there.

And if they're simply anti Trump enough that they would say yes, because those aren't the ones that are always like change. They're just more like someone normal. You know, they're not the big change agents. In fact, change, freaks them out a little bit. And so those are the voters I'm most worried about now.

That being said, I think that she's so far. And those are the ones who are also like a lady president, a black lady president or like. And yeah, you don't say your pronouns to those old people. They do not. I don't think you should say your pronouns, period.

I do not think that is helpful. when you were trying to win an election. She should take her pronouns off of anything she's doing right now.

We're not going to take about.

They can get excited. They will be much more concerned about the San Francisco progressive of it all than the black woman of it all, because if she shows them that she's tough, that she can prosecute a case against Donald Trump and that she's not coming for their fracking or their and she might be. But, you know, if she's not going to leave the border wide open, like if she could sort of convince those people of that. And I think that's obviously the tension for any Democrat who runs right now. But this is where I feel like she could have it.

I feel like there is desperation of the Democratic base to have her do well. Like people are pulling for her. And I feel like she could get some latitude on a few policy issues. Maybe not Gaza, but on maybe on some energy independence. run on kitchen table issues.

Talk about the economy that she wants to be there for everybody, where Trump's there for himself. I think you could start to get there with those people.

It is wrong headed thinking to think that the only way you're going to get communities to be safe is to put more police officers on the street.

I don't think this is what we want here to decriminalize illegal border crossings. But what do you think she can get away with here? Right. Like, does she just take a mulligan on everything she said in the 2020 campaign? Or does she say, like, you know, let me tell you what I've done the last four years with Joe Biden, who is my partner.

And when I met when I was actually in the White House and when we've been governing, this is how we've governed. You know, I don't, I don't know what she said. Here's what I would say.

I have seen what it means to govern, not in California, but for this entire country.

I do think she's got to do some of that, and I will be, you know, if she can do that. And this is where I think the party's got to give her the latitude to do that. I believe that the American people, they can run that out a lot and it's going to hurt her. And, frankly, they've got to get up on TV as fast as humanly possible with the new rebrand of her. But the American people are like I get learning, and especially learning and changing one's mind.

You mentioned them getting up on the air. They do get up on the air like they have a lot of choices here. Obviously, they're going to have to push back on some of these negative ads, or at least do so on their own terms. What do you think voters would like to hear from her or know about her in this period where she's trying to define herself?

I think you could do a little bit of Obama here, but like very future oriented. But America is a great place because people are going to try to paint her. I should have said this during the sort of what do you hear about race and gender? I'm not necessarily hearing this in the focus groups, but I know Republicans are going to do this. D.I.

president, stuff is real. It's going to work with a certain kind of person more on the grounds of like. it's going to tag into the. she didn't earn it right. She just got this handed to her from Joe Biden.

So I think that she has to show people a sense of like. I'm an American and I love this country. Like this country gave me a lot. I am good with this country. You know, because people they're going to try to paint her as something outside.

This is why the Obama birth certificate was a thing. Right. They will take anybody who is of color or any other difference, and they will try to paint it as outside the mainstream and somewhere outside in a way that people can't connect to. And so she needs to connect to them on the things that they can feel happy and good about, which is like and Joe Biden was good at this. Joe Biden, even in his in his speech saying goodbye last night, I had my quibbles with it.

But the way he talks about America is the way I feel about America. And one of the reasons that I struggled, actually, one of the reasons I was a Republican is I felt like Democrats were down on America and they would say be negative about America. But now Trump's the one talking negatively about America. And so, like, I think she can own America if she tries like broad messaging.

my name is Barack Hussein Obama. My father was born in Kenya. But like somehow that's what this country is all about, that someone like me can be included here. You know, and I do think that that she's going to have a moment, I think, probably at the top of that convention speech, where she reintroduces herself to the country where it's going to be like very important. And that she does exactly what you're saying.

Yeah, well, that's my play. That's my pitch. Yeah, no, I agree. So she has also some big decisions to make around how she talks about Trump and how much she talks about Trump. So far, she has a riff that compares her track record as a prosecutor with his track record as a criminal.

She talks about how Trump would bring chaos, fear and hate. She talks about Project 2025. based on your conversations with voters. What messages about Trump do you think at this point have the potential to move voters? And how much should she make the election a referendum on Trump versus like?

she's got to do more work than Biden, obviously, to introduce herself, her views, her plans?

And Donald Trump gets high marks for being decisive, looking, you know, strong leadership. And that's because people are confusing sort of the strongman, authoritarian stuff with leadership. But I think that if she goes at him in a way that feels and she's been doing this so far, like you can see it when she's doing it right now, for example, I just saw a clip of her saying, I want to debate. I'm ready to debate. He's trying to backpedal.

Let's debate. Let's do it anytime, anywhere. Yes. Like that. Right.

It is about sort of showing. I am not scared of this man one bit. But there is a grievance victim thing and, like the out to get Trump thing. There's a way where you can sort of tip into what people tag is like kind of Trump derangement syndrome. Yeah.

And you get there by talking about Trump too much. Right. So this is this is the point you were just making where she has got to find a way to be prosecuting a case against Trump, but not always on just behavior. He's immoral or democracy. It also has to be on.

And I just saw something to this effect. Right. They're not looking back how he mishandled covid and drove the economy into the ditch, how he doesn't care about middle class people, like how he does tax cuts for the rich. Like you can't just prosecute the case on sort of democracy and he's a bad guy. You have to tie it into policies that she can contrast with.

Yes. You know, she's got to keep making that pivot to people, I think. That's right. And she's doing it well. How are the voters you've talked to in the last week feeling about Trump?

Did they, did you detect any newfound admiration for him after the assassination attempt?

Oh, God. They think so little of him that there's a lot of like, I don't know about this. Seems like it could be staged. There's been a fair amount of that to the point where I'm like, oh, right. Yeah.

These are not like the hardcore, you know, Dems or anything, but because they think Trump sucks. And so they think like he would, and he's a show person and a liar, and none of them like a lot of it. We asked and introduced the idea that you were hearing from a lot of sort of cable news. And, you know, do you think that this will change Trump? And everyone was like, no.

You know, like there was no sense from the voters. I was watching Fox News last night during his speech. And so I was watching Laura Ingram. And, you know, I think for Fox News watchers, they will continue to treat Trump as a martyr. But that is not coming through with swing voters.

When swing voters talk about Trump, they dislike him intensely. Some of them are willing to vote for him based on things like the economy or the fact that he says he's going to do something about the border. It is not because they like him or they feel good about him really in any way. And that's why getting a credible alternative is so important that they can just get there on Project 2025.

And it went from never being mentioned to it comes up in absolutely every group. now. I would say, their ability to drill down into it and know what something is in it is pretty one. The moderator said to one woman who was like, you, there's really scary this Project 2025.. And she was like, well, what specifically scares you about it?

And yeah, well, you know, it's and finally came up with it. It wants to eliminate gay marriage, which I don't know that eliminating gay marriage is in there. It does do a lot of traditional family stuff. But anyway, the point is, is it's become this cat. It's like woke.

It's like woke. It's just like a catch all boogeyman for people. And so I think that there is a tremendous amount of opportunity, though, because the 900 page Project 2025 is batshit crazy. Yeah. And there is so much that you can pull out.

And I would not do not do what Democrats do, where they build an enormous PowerPoint presentation on it. Like find the five things that women are really going to care about, because there's a lot of stuff about, like eliminating child care, things like, you know, find a series of things in there that women would care about, that, you know, different things. And like drive those things home for people. I do think you have to sort of teach more about it. But I'll tell you, Democrats have been given a gift on messaging, where organically people have decided that they care about this and they're telling other people to care about this, and that it's scary.

And I think that there's a little bit of bitterness. This is especially within swing voters. I think there's a little bit of bitterness that it's sort of like has played out the way that it has. And so I think Kamala Harris says, I'm going to earn this. I mean, sometimes I was like, I sort of wish Cori Bush could have done a little mini primary against her.

John Lovett would understand this, but sometimes you need a fire making challenge, right? To get to the end, you got to have a fire making challenge to show you've earned it.

I think she's going to have to do some of that to bring some of these people around who feel like when you the DEI stuff is about not earning things. And so you don't want that to take hold too much. And so I think some acknowledgement of that is good. But man, no, she should be. she should go hard on immigration.

Not hard, but I think that she should sound a little hawkish. I think it's funny because they're grabbing her when she was running to the left of everybody in the 2020 primary. But if you see stuff from actually before that, when she was a prosecutor, suddenly you're like, oh, hey, look at that. I'm like, oh, this. this warms my heart.

listening to this. She's telling kids to get their butts back in school. You know, she's being tough. I love that stuff.

it's simple and it's there and it's very popular and has been for some time.

Right. It's hard not to argue as yourself, but to argue with somebody else. It makes you have to calculate a lot more, calibrate a lot more. And my hope, and I think even my expectation, is that her being allowed to be authentically herself as she runs this campaign could be one of the best things for her, not just because I think she'll be slightly more moderate on policy, but because I think that they won't be able to. I think she will look like a different person to them, in her authentic skin, in her authentic, like way of being, getting to define these policies for herself.

That's what I'm seeing from her so far. And I'll tell you what, man, nothing with these voters, all of them, beats authenticity.

That's like her being like, you know what, I'm a little goofy, but I know who I am. I feel good about who I am. And this is just who I'm going to be right now. Like, she's sort of, like sort of calmed down the last year and just like, sort of found herself a little bit. And I think so.

I think it puts her in a good position to do exactly what you just said. Sarah Longwell, thank you, as always. I know you're you're busy conducting so many focus groups. So we appreciate you coming back on The Wilderness. And we'll talk to you again soon.

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