Posted on 09/01/2024 7:24:47 AM PDT by MtnClimber
A book written by progressives, about progressives, blasted Kamala Harris at a time when political observers speculated whether she would be replaced as Joe Biden’s vice president. In it, White House aides outlined Harris’s inability to define a political agenda and her total reliance on personality.
Now, with Harris in a tight race for the presidency with Donald Trump, the book has been resurfaced eight months after its release.
As recently as the summer of 2023, a cavalcade of Democratic party superstars like California Gov. Gavin Newsom were brandishing their leadership credentials as calls grew for Biden to step aside. Once that time passed, the left-wing whisper machine turned on Harris and her historically abysmal favorability numbers.
Enter “The Truce: Progressives, Centrists, and the Future of the Democratic Party,” which dropped in January. That was just enough time for the left to replace Kamala Harris and, one would think, supplied them with enough ammunition to do it.
“It was rotten from the start,” a top aide from her 2020 campaign noted. “A lot of us, at least folks that I was friends with on the campaign, all realized that: ‘Yeah, this person should not be president of the United States,’ the aide told the authors.
The book, authored by Hunter Walker and Luppe B. Luppen, was written and published long before Harris was coronated as the heir apparent of the Democratic party’s presidential ticket.
The scathing quotes from insiders of her failed 2020 campaign painted a picture of Harris as a vapid and ineffectual leader who offers no clear picture of who she is politically or how she would govern as the president.
Some staffers spoke of discord as a result of tensions between Harris’ family and the top consulting firm she hired to advise her.
Staffers described a high level of dysfunction centered on the relationship between Harris’s sister Maya, who served as the campaign’s chair, and Bearstars Strategies’ Juan Rodriguez, who was serving as her campaign manager.
The divide between Rodriguez and Maya Harris became so toxic they moved to opposite wings of campaign headquarters and would hold separate meetings with staff.
“It was the most awkward day of my life,” a senior staffer told the authors. “People were literally having a thirty-minute audit meeting with Juan about how the campaign was going and then they were walking across the hall into the same meeting with Maya … I remember Juan popping into my office to find out how the meeting with Maya went.”
Campaign dysfunction extended beyond the family affair, too. Poor management of funds was a common theme, staffers told the authors.
“She cared less about how much money I was raising for her and more about what I was doing to create a good inclusive workspace,” a consultant told the authors. When Harris dropped out of the primary in December 2019, she cited lack of funds as the primary motivation for her decision.
The money management, however, was just one aspect of an overall “toxic climate,” the authors wrote.
In November 2019, the campaign’s state operations manager Kelly Mehlenbacher resigned in a scathing letter that was leaked to The New York Times.
“This is my third presidential campaign and I have never seen an organization treat its staff so poorly,” she wrote.
” … because we have refused to confront our mistakes, foster an environment of critical thinking and honest feedback, or trust the expertise of talented staff, we find ourselves making the same unforced errors over and over,” Mehlenbacher wrote.
Rather than an isolated incident unique to her presidential campaign, the book’s authors say reports of toxicity came from staffers who worked with her in San Francisco, in the Senate, her presidential campaign and as Vice President.
The complaints “came from sources who signed up to work for her and, at least at one point, wanted her to succeed. It’s impossible to dismiss all of their critiques as entirely the result of prejudice,” they wrote.
One unnamed staffer described working for her as being like “Game of Thrones.”
As VP, she saw a shocking 91.5 percent turnover rate among her staff, according to an Open The Books review. Some notable departures included her “chief of staff, communications director, domestic-policy adviser and national security adviser,” according to The Atlantic.
Her fundraising woes briefly let up during her campaign, as she was the beneficiary of a fundraising boon on the back of her June 2019 debate performance when she attacked front-runner Joe Biden with a racial argument.
Harris, the only black candidate in a crowd of 10, went after Biden for his praise of segregationists. She spoke of her experience being bussed to school during California’s desegregation efforts in the 1970s.
The line of attack was, according to the authors, a “showstopper,” and resulted in a filling of her campaign coffers. “Everything we did for like a week turned to gold,” a campaign staffer said. The honeymoon, however, quickly subsided.
The Biden campaign meanwhile, challenged Harris to actually make clear her position on bussing.
“If you attack somebody for a policy position, it’s fair for you to ask, ‘What’s your policy position?,” Biden’s campaign manager Greg Schultz noted.
On debate night Harris advocated for a federal mandate, but a week later she waffled on that position. While campaigning in Iowa she told reporters that “while she would have supported federally mandated busing in circumstances like those that existed in the ’70s, she wouldn’t support it in contemporary America,” the book’s authors wrote.
This, the authors noted, was nearly identical to Biden’s position on the issue.
Her bussing ambiguity was just one of her notable flip-flops highlighted by the authors.
Over a year before she launched her presidential campaign, Harris signed on to Independent Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders’s “Medicare for All” bill. The bill would enroll every American into a single-payer healthcare system, a position well to the left of any mainstream Democrat.
But, while initially defending the plan, she began to walk back her position and maintained her plan would still carve out an outsized role for private insurers.
Her refusal to go full bore on a single-payer plan “hurt us,” a staffer on her digital team told the authors.
“That hurt our fundraising numbers. That hurt us with Democratic activists, and that’s a problem. The last thing you ever want to be seen as is wishy-washy or flip-floppy,” the staffer said.
The issue underpinned an overall inability to define herself in any meaningful way or pick a direction for her campaign.
“Harris seemed to be trying to straddle the left flank and middle ground, but she ended up nowhere,” the book’s authors wrote.
Despite Harris’ failed campaign — she dropped out of the primary in December 2019 without earning a single delegate — she still found her way on to the presidential ticket. But her selection did little to alleviate her staff’s concerns.
“While Harris’s campaign was unquestionably successful in the sense that it elevated her to the second-highest office in the land, those closest to it were left with deep-seated doubts about her ability to lead.”
Democrats writ large struggled to envision Harris being able to win the White House.
“The fear was Kamala Harris could not win a race against Donald Trump, or perhaps against any Republican at all,” the authors wrote.
In fact, she was so deeply unpopular that left-friendly pundits suggested Biden replace her on the ticket.
“Biden could encourage a more open vice-presidential selection process that could produce a stronger running mate,” Washington Post columnist David Ignatius wrote in September 2023.
At the time, her favorability ratings hovered between 39 and 40 percent, according to polling site fivethirtyeight.com.
Others, like New York Magazine’s Eric Levitz, suggested Biden swap her out for the likes of Democratic Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Democratic Senators Raphael Warnock of Georgia or Tammy Duckworth of Illinois.
Her lack of policy positions meant she was leaning heavily on her charisma, something those close to her questioned.
“Harris struggled to decide what she was offering voters beyond her compelling persona,” the book’s authors wrote.
“That’s a lot of the reason people supported her,” a senior staffer said. “But you’ve got to back that up with ‘What are you going to do?’”
The clairvoyant quote from the staffer has proven to be quite prescient as, just over five weeks after Biden dropped out and endorsed Kamala, she’s hardly outlined any policy positions at all.
The only policy positions she’s personally vocalized are plans to implement price controls as a way to curb grocery store price gouging and tax proposals that include expanding the Earned Income and Child Tax Credits.
Beyond this, nearly all of the information regarding her presidential plans have come from anonymous staffers’ slow-drip leaks to news outlets.
Her lack of concrete proposals and continued reliance on charisma and vibes continue a pattern her aides said made her unfit for the presidency.
“Kamala is not ready for prime time,” a senior White House staffer told the authors. “She ain’t made for this.”
Poor management of campaign funds....I’m shocked.
Joe wasn’t made for it either, but they installed him.
I think they want Hitlery.
After confrontations by Obama/Pelosi....I think Joe’s mindset was....lets give them an impossible-to-win candidate.
That's why she's a puppet. If successful, this will be the model from now on.
That's why Biden has Kamala as his VP. There's a reason why we did not hear from her the past three and a half years.
One should seriously question the sanity or patriotism of anyone supporting Commiekamalamadingdong for President.
blasted Kamala Harris at a time when political observers speculated whether she would be replaced as Joe Biden’s vice president.
In other words the Biden Crime Family signed off on the book to make sure Joey wouldn’t have any competition from Komrade Kammy.
It didn’t work.
Now I guess it can be used as ammunition against Kammy.
Not sure if it will be that effective.
Not sure the undecided read much.
Besides Elite Stream Media will bury it as they will never tell the truth about any Marxist.
One thing and only one thing got Biden and Harris elected ignorance the democrat party went over board with the rigging it was a give a way.
“Her lack of concrete proposals and continued reliance on charisma”
What charisma?
Hitlery ain’t made for it either-loser.
Bernie is the real deal but the higher-ups are afraid he’d lose even bigger. They need to give Bernie his chance to move the needle for a future victory down the road similar to what Goldwater did in ‘64. Too late now.
UH....NO DEMOCRAT IS MADE TOLEAD AMERICA IN A GOOD DIRECTION! NONE!!!
BTTT
Well, the MSM were certainly successful in HIDING THIS.
A BOOK ABOUT HOW LOUSY KAMMIE IS?????
WOW.
CAME OUT IN JANUARY???
“After confrontations by Obama/Pelosi....I think Joe’s mindset was....lets give them an impossible-to-win candidate.”
Joe isn’t that smart. Maybe Jill? Either way, Harris has a great chance of being installed.
I WANT DNA/23 & ME ancestry test on her.
SHE IS NOT BLACK
Frankly, small part of my feels that the United States deserves her.
Let’s go to the real issues——Kamala’s climbing the political ladder with her oral sex skills.
Kamala Harris’ sexual relationship history as we know it:
<><>she was a subordinate in the San Francisco DA’s office,
<><>she started dating Willie Brown, the most powerful man in California politics,
<><>Brown was 31 years older than 29 y/o Harris....and married.
<><>Harris failed the bar exam and is not exactly known for her mastery of the law,
<><>the then-DA passed over Harris for promotion
<><>but Willie Brown was instrumental in alienating the existing DA,
<><>Brown appointed her to two well-paying patronage positions in state govt
<><>(netting her about $250,000 per year in 2024 dollars)
<><>Brown was personally involved in raising money for Kamala
<><>Brown was running Harris’ successful campaign to get elected DA
<><>DA Harris let a number of Willie Brown’s friends off as they faced serious charges
<><>one egregious case that skated was a city contractor (a Willie Brown donor)
<><>he used cheaper, recycled concrete to build bridges and other structures.
<><>the scot-free Brown donor defrauded taxpayers and endangered their lives
This was all reported in detail by local S/Francisco media when it happened. Harris abased herself personally and engaged in political corruption at the behest of a man who advanced her political career.
Biden was never in charge and Kamala won’t be in charge if she wins. People will just elect the party and the party will run things. I have even read liberals argue that it doesn’t matter who they elect as long as it’s a democracy since that means the Party will run things anyway
We should have listened to Washington when he said political parties were a bad idea
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