At a brewery, Democratic White House candidate Kamala Harris took a path toward the future, separating herself a little further from Joe Biden’s economic line as she tries to run as the candidate of change from an incumbent administration that is driving Donald Trump to distraction.
The vice president stopped on Wednesday (4) in New Hampshire — home to four precious electoral votes — before heading to the debate field in Pittsburgh ahead of her televised showdown with the former president next week that could define the election outcome.
Harris’s political momentum and her chances in November depend in part on her success in presenting herself as a new option to voters and dispelling any notion that she is championing a second term for the unpopular President Joe Biden.
This underpins his efforts to court Americans who are angry about high food prices and priced out of the housing market, as well as his outreach to suburban moderates and middle-class voters in swing states.
The vice president has previously vowed to crack down on price gouging by retail giants and promised to give low-income first-time homebuyers $25,000 as a down payment. On Wednesday (4), she moved toward the political middle by promising to boost 25 million new small businesses in her first term, with a $50,000 tax deduction for startups. And she called for a significantly smaller increase in capital gains taxes than Biden has proposed to spur investment and innovation.
“I believe that America’s small businesses are a critical foundation for our entire economy,” Harris said at a brewery founded by two female business pioneers who source local ingredients. “Small businesses in our country employ half of all private sector workers. Half of all private sector workers own or operate a small business or work for a small business.”
The former president, who is fueling nostalgia for Trump’s economy before the crisis triggered by the Covid-19 emergency, may try to respond to Harris’ recent economic maneuvers when he speaks at the Economic Club of New York this Thursday (5).
Seeking distance from Biden
The politics behind Harris’ strategy are clear. On the capital gains tax measure, for example, Harris has departed from Biden’s more progressive approach by calling for a 28% rate on those earning $1 million or more, rather than the 39.6% rate the president included in his budget for fiscal year 2025.
Her gesture allows her to show that she is not a hostage to her boss’s policies, while refuting Trump’s claim that she is the heir to a failed economic legacy. It will also not go unnoticed by the wealthy Democratic donors who have helped her raise half a billion dollars in campaign cash.
Harris’ embrace of the powerful mythology of American small businesses driving broader prosperity and the broader economy also seems designed to counter attempts by Trump and surrogates to dismiss the California Democrat as an extreme “San Francisco liberal,” a “communist” and a “Bolshevik.”
Their new approaches have led economists to debate the viability of “Harrisomics.” Would its federal ban on price gouging simply lead to shortages of goods, as has happened in the past? And would pouring more money into housing inevitably inflate prices and make homes even more unaffordable?
These issues could prove problematic in the early weeks of a potential Harris administration. But less than nine weeks after the election, Harris is more concerned with making a strong political impression than with the mechanics of economic policy.
Given Trump’s lead in the polls on the economy, a deep political fight over the issue with his rival would probably not be wise anyway. Harris needs to make the election a referendum on personality and on which candidate can present themselves as a new political force. Even small steps out of Biden’s shadow could therefore be important.
Harris, for example, has done far more than Biden to show that she understands the pain of young adults locked out of the housing market and of buyers who fear the cost of their weekly grocery shopping. During his campaign, the president often outrageously touted the economy’s successes and downplayed the difficulties that remain.
Why Harris May Need to Step Away from Biden
James Carville laid out a potential strategy for Harris in a New York Times column on Monday.
He said the 2024 election would be defined by “who is new and who is rotten.” The veteran Democratic strategist also wrote that it would not be an insult to Biden if Harris went her own way — it was imperative to her political identity.
“This shows even more clearly that she is passionate about her own ideas and stands for change rather than more of the same,” he wrote, recalling the slogan that helped former President Bill Clinton prevail as the candidate for change over President George H.W. Bush in 1992.
Harris’s attempt to convince voters that she is a breath of fresh air is infuriating Trump. The former president’s comments and campaign statements are filled with frustration that Harris, after four years in the Biden administration, is taking on a new outlook. Trump is not accepting that he has lost his role as an agent of change in the race.
Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance expressed disbelief that Harris would attempt such a change of course in an interview with Hugh Hewitt’s radio show on Wednesday (4).
The Ohio senator sought to thwart Harris’s image makeover by emphasizing that she was an incumbent. “You’re the vice president of the United States. You could be enacting these policies right away, but you’re not,” Vance said. “She caused this inflation crisis with her policies and now she wants to fix it by waving a magic wand.”
Vance also rejected the vice president’s plan to lower food prices, although he acknowledged that not every American company was an “angel.”
“We’ve had price controls before in this country and elsewhere. It fails every time it happens,” Vance said. “It means you can’t afford to buy flour. You can’t buy eggs at the grocery store. That’s what price controls do.”
The Trump campaign is also seeking to counter Harris’s economic stance with a cutting ad campaign.
A recent ad in Georgia featured clips of news coverage of negative economic headlines. One news anchor lamented “the alarming rise in inflation, which has reached its highest level in nearly 40 years.” Another said, “We’re still dealing with inflation.” Between the clips, the campaign featured a tape of Harris praising “Bidenomics” and cheerfully saying in speeches that “Bidenomics is working.”
The Trump campaign on Wednesday rejected Harris’s small business plan, arguing that she would push for higher income taxes and expanded estate taxes, among other measures that would hurt small businesses and consumers. The former president has previously addressed the vice president’s adoption of her own proposal to end tip taxes, which was seen as a dig at hospitality workers in the swing state of Nevada.
Trump has been proclaiming that if Harris wins in November, the economy will fall into a Great Depression. He said much the same about Biden in 2020, but the president has presided over strong, consistent job growth and one of the strongest recoveries from the pandemic of any developed economy, despite an inflationary crisis that his White House initially downplayed.
Trump’s plans are often as vague as those of his Democratic rival. As he did as president, Trump has promised big deals for Americans without specifying how he would make them work or pay for them. He offered this jumble of words on Fox News on Sunday, for example: “We’re going to take care of Social Security, we’re not going to do anything to hurt our seniors. There’s so much cutting, there’s so much waste in this administration. There’s so much fat in this administration.”
Meanwhile, Trump’s plan to dramatically increase tariffs on imports — especially those from China — has prompted many economists to warn that it will dramatically increase costs for consumers and trigger a new round of inflation.
But at this critical moment in a bitter campaign, both Harris and Trump appear less concerned with economic policies that have been proven to work than with those that can provide an immediate political benefit.
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This content was originally published in Analysis: Kamala Harris distances herself from Biden on the economy and frustrates Trump on the CNN Brasil website.
Source: CNN Brasil
Bruce Belcher is a seasoned author with over 5 years of experience in world news. He writes for online news websites and provides in-depth analysis on the world stock market. Bruce is known for his insightful perspectives and commitment to keeping the public informed.
