This is the next of our series of missives on our unfinished work to restore the promise of our country and its government. Each will focus on a single element of the many opportunities and challenges that lie ahead. Each will provide three steps we can all take to build upon our huge victories winning back the House in 2018 and the Presidency in 2020.
If you are not already receiving these messages by email, please click here to be added to our list. You can also follow me on Facebook where you can read and share these messages. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement. We share these posts on our blog, Our Unfinished Work, every three to four weeks.
Our step has a new bounce. On one day, we were a part of Joe Biden’s losing bet. He had wagered that voters would discount his decline in the face of Donald Trump’s malevolence. From the time he made that bet in 2023, we were in danger of losing it, and it happened on one single debate night. It wasn’t just that polls in swing states got scary. It was that there was no way to move forward to change those projected outcomes, given Biden’s frailties. There wasn’t a way to reset, and none would develop.
On the next day, we were offered a first-rate opportunity and a hundred days to take advantage of it. Our energy boost is huge. We are in play in an all-new way. We are fortunate that we didn’t lose the Biden bet in the September debate, which would have been too late for any recovery. It is not an inevitable outcome, but we know what we must do and what Kamala Harris must do to win the Presidency. So, let’s spend the next hundred days doing it, and she will too.
The race is suddenly fluid. The encouraging signs are everywhere, way beyond the $250 million that Kamala Harris’ campaign and a Super PAC raised in the three days after Joe Biden’s withdrawal. CNN reports that compared to Biden in early July, Harris polls 9 percentage points higher among independents, 8 percentage points higher among people of color, and 6 percentage points higher among women. Try as he might, Trump will not be able to shield himself from having overturned the protection of Roe v Wade. A new Axios/Generation Lab poll shows Harris doing 7 percentage points better than Biden among 18–35-year-olds.
Certainly, we need to find an additional boost from this boost. Here’s the five places from which it is most likely to come:
The selection of the vice president has everything to do with our competitiveness in swing states. Unworried about chromosomal makeup, this missive would pick Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer in a heartbeat, because of her ability to reinforce the blue wall in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan. An excellent case could be made for Arizona Senator Marc Kelly, a Navy captain and astronaut from a border state. Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear has youth and blue-collar credibility and could stick a pin in the highly over-inflated J.D. Vance balloon.
Trump’s physical and cognitive decline has become more evident. Kamala Harris should challenge Trump to a one-mile walk. Hannibal Lecter is now showing up as a commendable, living human being in Trump’s rally speeches. At one point, Joe Biden tweeted, “Donald, Hannibal Lecter is not real. And he is a cannibal.”
Any debate between Trump and Harris gives Harris a chance to use her prosecutorial skills to counter Trump’s cascade of lies. What Trump will say in a debate is entirely predictable. Harris’ counter will obviously be better delivered than Joe Biden’s. Plus, there is a real possibility that her fighting back will elicit never too far under the surface misogyny and racism from Donald Trump. Harris’ “abuser, fraudster, cheater” description of Trump isn’t going to go away. She knows his type.
Trump’s multiple legal problems will reemerge in September, the worst time for him. As regrettable as was the Supreme Court decision on presidential immunity, it still left a path for justice. In the hush money case, Judge Juan Merchan will sentence Trump in September, finding Trump’s felonies occurred prior to his election, putting them outside the Supreme Court’s broad protections. Merchan’s sentencing will elicit an appeal which the Supreme Court will not hear before November, if at all. Perhaps even more useful, Federal District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan will be holding evidentiary hearings in September or October on which of Trump’s election fraud actions represented “private acts”, also outside the Supreme Court’s shield. This will put damning testimony from former Trump aides before the public daily.
Kamala Harris can get a boost from us. Joe Biden won in 2020 in part because of the extraordinary effort behind him. We cannot and will not be out-organized or out-funded. We should be doing these three things without delay, taking advantage of the Kamala Harris driven new burst of energy.
| 1) If You Have Money, Send It | |
| Find your checkbook or credit card. On the funding side we must follow cardinal rules. After giving money in the ultra-close presidential race, we can be careful to not donate to candidates who a) don’t need the money or b) aren’t going to win even if they have the money. Instead, we are looking for races hanging in the balance. Helping to target races are such strong organizations as Focus for Democracy and the Movement Voter Project, sorting out cost effectiveness and using this learning to provide guidance. Swing Left does an excellent job of identifying targeted Congressional and Senate races. Sometimes, unique ways to give emerge. In this case, there is the political action committee called Haley Voters for Harris. They still believe the things Nikki Haley said about Donald Trump this winter. Their money is being used to capture for Harris the votes that went to Haley in the primary. Out there also is the more established Republican Voters Against Trump. | |
2) If You Have Time, Give It | |
 | Now that we are fully back in play, you can put time into campaigning as well as money. If you want to present yourself to be deployed in another state, no one will do it better than Common Power which attends to training and on the ground supervision as well as placement. After dinner is removed, your kitchen table can be the site of postcard campaign participation through Postcards to Voters or Vote Forward. |
3) Don’t Forget the Grassroots | |
 | Readers of this missive provide bedrock support to organizers around the country, all of whom have targeted efforts in swing states. These leap out: Walk the Walk is volunteer run, focusing on registering people of color in 11 states. Reproductive Freedom for All is a great way to focus on states where pro-choice initiatives are on the ballot, including Florida, Nevada and Arizona Mi Familia Vota organizes Latino voters in eight targeted states, including the burgeoning Latino population in North Carolina. Rock the Vote is the largest organizer of young voters, where Kamala Harris has already made important inroads. And thank you Taylor Swift wherever you are. The Rural Youth Voter Project is turning out young voters in rural areas, focusing on people of color. |
What to do in the next hundred days? Why not spend it taking advantage of this sudden, fresh opportunity to create a Trump-free future.
David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington
