Quickly following Vice President Harris’ nomination from the Democratic party, the GOP started their verbal assault on the candidate.
Smashing Records
Vice President Kamala Harris broke records in the first 24 hours of her presidential campaign after securing a historic $81 million along with enough delegates to make her nomination official.
Some Republicans could not hold their tongue for longer than that and were quick to play the diversity card on Harris. “One hundred percent she is a DEI hire,” said Tennessee Republican Tim Burchett on CNN. “Her record is abysmal at best.”
This tactic is nothing new for the Republican party. It reminds political analysts of the strategies used back in the 2008 election in order to create a conspiracy around Barack Obama’s birthplace and his legitimacy as a candidate.
Many experts fear that we are heading down the same road again, as GOP members call Harris a “DEI hire” and question where her parents truly immigrated from.
A Look at Mediocrity
Democratic strategist Keith Boykin said, “There’s been this constant debate about mediocrity versus meritocracy. The truth is for most of American history, White men were the only people who were ever considered, it didn’t matter if they were mediocre”.
Boykin described a similar situation with the Republican “Southern Strategy” from the 1960s, where many politicians used racial issues and grievances to drive white voters straight into their arms.
Boykin explained, “(Meritocracy) became a part of the conversation when Black people, and women, and people of color and queer people started to enter into the workforce and society in public ways. And suddenly there became this assumption that anybody who wasn’t a straight White man didn’t deserve to be there.”
Burchett’s claim that she was chosen simply for her race was jumped on and discredited quickly by Democrats and political analysts alike, mentioning how often Black women in the workplace often become targets.
Harris had a decades-long career as a prosecutor before becoming the Vice President, eventually becoming a district attorney and later the attorney general of California. In 2016, Harris won the California U.S. Senate race and became both the state’s first Black and South Asian senator.
GOP Remains Stubborn
For some reason, Republicans do not recognize her vast experience with the law and politics as valid enough for a presidential ticket.
The current discussions around this year’s presidential ticket often center around identity politics and how voters are swayed to vote more so for personality or ideology than actual political knowledge or beliefs.
Boykin reminds us, “(Obama) was a United States senator, a former state senator and a constitutional scholar and a best-selling author and they claimed he wasn’t qualified. But then they picked Donald Trump, who had no experience in government, and they don’t even say anything about his qualifications”.
Continuing, “Kamala Harris, who was a former district attorney, former attorney general, former United States senator and current vice president is a ‘DEI hire’ in their minds, just because she’s a Black woman. I mean, you couldn’t get more transparent than that”.
Opposite Effect
Republicans seem to be strategizing for the short term, as analysts believe that continued attacks on Harris’s race or gender will not work forever. In fact, Burchett’s uneducated remark helped to energize Black voters to take a stand.
Within the first 72 hours of Harris’ nomination, more than $2.8 million was raced by thousands of Black Americans via Zoom and campaigning under #winwithBlackwomen and #winwithBlackmen.
When speaking at her first presidential campaign rally as the Democratic presumptive nominee, Kamala Harris did not seem affected by the racist claims.
Instead, she reminded the listeners that she is both a prosecutor and a politician and that, “In those roles I took on perpetrators of all kinds, predators who abused women, fraudsters who ripped off consumers, cheaters who broke the rules for their own gain. So, hear me when I say, I know Donald Trump’s type”.
Ready to Fight
Amid cheers and chants, Harris said, “And in this campaign, I promise you I will proudly put my record against his any day of the week.”
Featured Image Credit: Shutterstock / Juli Hansen.
