If you’ve found the coverage of Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign frustratingly shallow, you’re not alone.
We know very little about her current policy positions or what she would pursue as president. But let’s not be so hard on journalists. The news coverage is lackluster because the Harris campaign is an empty shell, built on emotion. It’s “good vibes” from start to finish. It’s hard for the media to report on something that doesn’t exist.
Harris has not yet met with anyone. Journalists. Her staff have been very careful to ensure she doesn’t make off-the-cuff remarks to reporters. Harris hasn’t laid out detailed policy positions, has barely detailed her agenda, and there isn’t even a section on her policies. Campaign website.
of New Yorker Jay Caspian Kang Perhaps most tellingly, he complained, “There’s energy and a good vibe in the Kamala campaign. At the presidential level, we haven’t seen that since Barack Obama’s last election. No one wants to ruin that with policy arguments.”
The Harris campaign has gone completely into hiding and appears to have no plans to widely expose their candidate to the press or public outside of carefully planned and coordinated campaign events. They are cruising along on the momentum of “joy” and vaguely positive press until Election Day.
The lack of policy details and a clear political vision has forced news outlets like Politico to hunt for stories, which unfortunately has resulted in a lot of empty, pointless reporting with headlines like these:Mindy Kaling is proud to be Kamala Harris’ cooking partner.” and “Black women see Tim Walz as the “white guy” fit to be vice president“
A campaign that says nothingThe New York TimesWe publish articles with headlines such as “.”Comedy critic talks about Kamala Harris’ laughs“The Trump campaign sees Harris’ laughter as a weakness to exploit, but far from being a weakness, it’s one of her most effective weapons,” reads the subheading.
Harris’ drug-free campaignAtlantic OceanSimilarly,Kamala Harris and the threat of women laughingThe subtitle reads, “Criticism of emotional expression has long been a favorite weapon of those seeking to undermine women in political power.”
Or, my personal favorite, this quote from the Lost Angeles Times: “Kamala Harris is a cook. And a good cook. Will that help her win?” The subheadline is even better: “Vice President Kamala Harris is a foodie who knows how to brine a turkey and where to get good Oaxacan food in Los Angeles. She’s made it part of her political persona.”
It’s hard to imagine VP Harris’ knowledge of Oaxacan cuisine would be of much use in key Waukesha County, but that’s what happens when there’s nothing to report.
Certainly, other Democratic candidates will receive similarly favorable coverage. But in the case of the Harris 2024 campaign, Reporters only report “good vibes” and boring stories. The reporting is terrible and we are drowning in endless “pleasure” nonsense, but it’s not all the reporting’s fault. It’s the apparent lack of substance that has led some journalists and pundits to start speculating about the policies Harris might pursue as president, in defense of the Democratic candidate.
They can’t fully defend her vision because they don’t know what she really believes in. When Democrats run a “vibe-only” campaign, they’re left with only speculation.
“Sometimes you have to ignore the economists,” read one newspaper headline. Atlantic Ocean An article that explores what Harris means when she says she wants to institute price controls to combat rising food prices.
AxiosIn an article called “Don’t Call It Price Controls: How Price Gouging Bans Actually Work,” I made the same point, using exactly the same speculative language.
Republican candidate Donald Trump can at least be described as pro-immigration. He can also be described as anti-China. But who could say anything about Harris’ policy positions that a spokesperson would not later deny?
The coverage of the Democratic campaign has been so thin because the campaign itself has been so thin. If the Harris campaign were a sitcom, it would be “Seinfeld,” not because it’s a show about sociopathic betrayals, but because it’s a show about nothing.
Beckett Adams is a Washington-based author.National Journalism Centre.
