Harris and the Media Face a Steep Climb
As Democrats focus on Vice President Kamala Harris’ bid to succeed President Joe Biden, the nation’s political media will get a chance to redeem itself.
Ever since former President Donald Trump announced plans to dethrone President Joseph Biden, the campaign coverage has focused relentlessly on polls that are inconsequential at this stage of the race, on President Biden’s age, and on the assassination attempt of former President Trump.
Photo by Nils Huenerfuerst
None of these issues are irrelevant. In fact, they all are important, particularly the security lapses that gave an armed young man a clear shot at Trump. But the intense focus on these issues overshadowed other relevant stories that the media should elevate with the ascension of Harris to the top of the ticket.
We don’t know for sure whether the Democrats who assemble in Chicago for their convention in August will nominate Harris. If they don’t, the story might be one of political suicide. To pass over the first female vice president who is also a woman of color would no doubt alienate a huge swath of voters, particularly women and minorities who are already drifting away from the Democratic party. Given President Biden’s endorsement of Harris, the party will probably avoid self-immolation.
The story will then no doubt turn to the challenges Harris faces and the record of the Biden administration of which Harris obviously was an integral part. And that’s where the media must provide the context and perspective that has been lacking in the coverage.
If history is a guide, Harris faces a steep climb. Of the nation’s forty-nine vice presidents, only four have been elected directly after serving as vice president, a job that John Nance Garner, the nation’s thirty-second VP, famously compared to “a bucket of warm spit.” Nine vice presidents lost elections to succeed the president under which they served. Nine VPS got to the Oval Office only after their presidents died, were assassinated or resigned, as President Richard Nixon did in 1974.
Succeeding the boss is not impossible. The pundits considered Vice President Harry Truman a long shot to defeat Thomas Dewey in 1948. But Truman launched a campaign with an extensive whistle-stop tour, traveling over 22,000 miles by rail and delivering speeches across the country. With feisty rhetoric against the Republican-controlled "do-nothing" eightieth Congress, Truman’s message resonated with many voters dissatisfied with partisan gridlock. Sound familiar? He scored a historic political comeback to become the nation’s thirty-third president.
Most of the VPs that failed became saddled with the policies of the administration in which they served. Former President Trump’s well-organized campaign is zeroing in on the Biden administration’s immigration policies in which Harris played a leading role. Team Trump also is focusing on Biden’s economic policies, sharpening an attack on the record of inflation that Harris inherits even if she didn’t play a direct role in economic policy.
This is where the media should provide some perspective. The Biden administration’s economic policies paved the way for inflation that led to a twenty percent increase in prices since Biden took office. However, the economy under Biden is hardly the disaster Trump and his running mate, Ohio Senator J. D, Vance, claim. The rate of inflation has fallen from a high of nine percent to about three percent, just shy of the U.S. Federal Reserve’s preferred two percent inflation target. The Fed under Biden’s tenure seems poised to achieve a so called “soft landing,” in which inflation is tamed without triggering a recession, a remarkable achievement. In fact, the economic output and jobs picture under Biden ranks among the best of any presidential term since 1980. Interest rates, which are set by the Fed, are expected to fall soon.
It will be Harris’ job to focus attention on the brighter side of the administration’s economic policies and to place responsibility for the nation’s abortion policy where it belongs – on a U.S. Supreme Court where Trump appointees provided the crucial votes to overturn a woman's right to choose. It will be the media’s job to listen and explain what really happened, though. Above all, it must stop allowing former President Trump to distort history. It must keep Harris accountable for what she says, too.
Part of the problem is the evolving structure of contemporary media. Overall, the well-documented decline leaves America with fewer news organizations that have the wherewithal to cover a national political campaign. The New York Times, the Washington Post and a few others dominate the coverage.
Although their print products suffer from the same declines as other news organizations, they have a vibrant presence online and the survivors, particularly The New York Times, retain immense influence in setting the news agenda for which issues get the most attention in other media organizations. This is not a healthy situation.
I agreed with President Biden’s decision to step aside to pave the way for Harris to run as the nation’s first female president. His debate performance was a disaster from which he could not recover. As a citizen, I thought he should not have run for a second term. As a journalist, though, I found the Times crusade to drive Biden from office offensive. It hurt the credibility of all media and psychologically confused the American public. The Times intense, lopsided coverage overshadowed Trump’s equally serious displays of cognitive decline characteristic of anyone who is seventy-eight. He often rambles and confuses names or makes no sense.
Now that Harris, who will be sixty just before the November election, is Trump’s opponent, the age issue is flipped. We need stories on aging that go beyond those about campaign strategy. We need good, solid, science-based coverage of what conditions could exist in an aging human being where cognitive decline drifts into dementia that can damage a president’s ability to function properly.
There’s no doubt that Harris played a key role in another policy that will take center stage in the upcoming election – the Biden administration's efforts to deal with immigration on America’s southern border.
Immigration is an issue that has been with the nation for a long time. It was a controversy during Harry Truman’s surprise victory in 1948, although it wasn’t as crucial an issue as now. The Biden administration unquestionably made mistakes on immigration that led to a mess on the southern border. But there’s little doubt that former President Trump convinced Republican legislators loyal to him to scuttle a bill that would have at least partially dealt with the situation. Republicans under Trump’s sway subordinated the interests of the country to get a campaign issue that they hope will help them win, not exactly a profile in courage.
The coming 2024 election will be historic. Voters must choose between two candidates, each with plenty of baggage. Providing Americans with information and news coverage in a fast-paced election is never easy. But providing Americans with context, perspective, and balance in news coverage is more crucial than ever. As Harry Truman once said: “The only thing new in the world is the history you don’t know.”
—James O’Shea
James O’Shea is a longtime Chicago author and journalist who now lives in North Carolina. He is the author of several books and is the former editor of the Los Angeles Times and managing editor of the Chicago Tribune. Follow Jim’s Five W’s Substack here.