Harris was set up to take the fall?

[Plumpribbon]

Many people at the start declared Harris not be to a great presidential candidate, never mind that she never had it in her to take on Trump.
Many voters saw someone not capable of leading the world’s largest economy’s or being able to sit around the table with Putin etc.

So why then was she appointed as nominee?

Yes, they were in a bind with Biden withdrawing or were they?

Everyone knew he was declining before our eyes, regardless of the lies espoused that he was fine. Yet still he was voted for …then knowing this was untenable, Harris then replaces him.

They did have enough time to hold a primary but they chose not to. They chose a sub par candidate to go against an extremely ugly Trump campaign.

AIBU to believe Harris was set up to take the fall against Trump because they knew they would lose against him regardless of which dem nominee they put forward and they didn’t want to taint their rising democrat stars in an ugly election with Trump?

Trump will be gone in four years (no to the alarmist narrative that he will serve a third) and their dem candidates won’t have to face such a nasty/ugly campaign.

There’s no way she will be elected the presidential nominee again that’s for sure…..yet the others remain untainted to go into battle at the next elections (Tom Cotton, Gretchen Whitner etc) . They were happy to sacrifice her career because they didn't think she was great to begin with. Now she will effectively disappear

well qualified, but the wider public simply didn't like her.

She won the popular vote.

I don't think the problem was Harris; the Dems lost the House as well. The truth is, people will vote for fascism, without being conned into it, or not knowing what they voted for. I do believe Trump is as dangerous as it gets, and for those believing it's only four years - you seriously don't believe he'll be trying to secure a Trump dynasty?

She wasn’t a good enough candidate. Everyone knew it and pretended she was. Just like they did pretending Biden was fine. That’s why they chose her.

100% this.

I remember in the summer when the idea of ditching Biden was starting to gain momentum, the commentators were evaluating all the potential replacements and time and again it was mentioned that Harris was not popular at all, too quiet, perceived as weak on the immigration file and pretty much not an option. That message was consistent from all outlets.

Then she was chosen. Surprised me, certainly.

Suddenly all that talk was gone, she was the best thing since sliced bread, our only hope, etc. Fundraising reflected this - which, on reflection, would likely have happened with any fresh face candidate.

But the novelty wore off. The cheerleading and endorsements couldn't paper over the cracks of those initial assessments and her weaknesses rose back to the surface over the course of the campaign.

Like others, I feel this was the Democrats to lose. Biden stuck around too long and left them in the lurch, too late to run a proper nomination campaign and they fell back to the VP default.

And now who knows what will happen.

For the umpteenth time, Michelle hated the White House and made it v clear she would never run herself

@Ledwood85
Kamala Harris was never responsible for immigration policy.

Yes- Harris who already had donors from the Biden- Harris ticket, is a known quantity and had a campaign infrastructure raised a lot of money quickly. The legal entities etc needed were already in place. The infrastructure was in place. The donors were lined up.

A new face - two new faces- would have had no chance of getting all of that set up, working, and ready to spend the money in the same time, with enough time to garner the support needed.

I didn't say she was.

https://www.nytimes.com/video/podcasts/the-daily/100000009811010/trump-election-results.html?smid=url-share

Good summary of where the democrats went wrong from the NYT podcast:

-That Harris didn’t have an election for nominee
-That the dems tied themselves to an unpopular administration
-that they had no policies
-That they abandoned the working class of all races
-That they relied on racist assumptions that black and Latino voters would vote for them
-That they handed trump the win by allowing him to become the vote for the disaffected

One thing missing, they haven’t mentioned the biggest elephant in the room- that Harris was no political heavyweight and couldn’t take on Trump.

In the flip states she’s only just under 50% of the votes. Same as the popular vote (48%). She could have won and could run again based on Donald Trump running again following a similar result. Hardly thrown under the bus.

There is no way, under any circumstances, that Harris, who had over a billion dollars spent on her campaign, will be the democratic nominee in the future. Zero chance.

Fine. But she also didn’t do terribly based on the stats I am looking at. The better question to ask IMO is why did Trump win.

The NYT podcast above spells out why he won. Save for the biggest reason, Harris wasn’t a very good candidate.

She is on course to be less popular than Hilary Clinton. Hilary!
There’s no way you can cut this to make the loss not look that bad .

No, that senile old fool `Biden hung on, and then the VP had to take over. Blame Biden

I don’t know, personally I think she did well given the difficult things facing her from all angles (Trump, the Biden shitshow, prejudice against her). Maybe she was set up for a fall though, who knows.

Hilary Clinton won the popular vote.

Yes, that precisely my point

Hilary managed to win the popular vote against trump even though she lost the election. Harris is on track to lose the popular vote as well as the election. Making her less popular than Hilary!

Being less popular than Hilary isn’t not being popular though. Trump is just more popular. Maybe it depends how you look at things. 🤷‍♀️ The results don’t suggest she was set up to lose to me.

Yes it is

Everyone groaned about Hilary…most of all the democrats. But they still voted for her

If you are going up against probably the most divisive man ever to have entered US politics. A man who even some of his own supporters admit to not liking him, then yes that makes you unpopular.

Or maybe if hillary stood this time would have done worse against trump.