like20 million othersEvery night last week, I watched this year’s high-energy,Celeb-sackDemocratic National Convention with lots of interest.
While the actual policy proposals came to a rhythm over the course of four nights, what flowed in abundance was that vibes — A palpable euphoria about the Democratic nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris, who eluded the party and voters in the months (and perhaps years) before President Joe Biden. Dropped out of the race.
Michelle Obama Best describes the Democrats’ ‘vibe shift’ When he noted: “There’s something wonderfully magical in the air, isn’t it? … We are feeling it here in this arena, but it is spreading to this land we love. A familiar feeling that is deeply buried.”
But what role could such magic play in a highly consequential US election? Vibes, after all, are not votes.
Can Harris turn the current eruption of tension into a persuasive argument for undecided and swing-state voters to cast their ballots?
Today, Vox senior political reporter Christian Paz, who covers the Democratic Party, joins me to help explain the Vibes candidacy, how it might translate to the election, and what we might be missing in the haze of excitement. Our interview was short and lightly edited.
Lavanya Ramanathan
so, is Is there really a vibe change happening among Democrats right now? It sure seems like it.
Christian Paz
Yes, and there are a few ways to measure it. The first is the approval rating or Favorability rating For Kamala Harris. One of the key things we saw was a pretty sharp contrast in his favorability ratings.
They’re pretty fired up as people get to know him, because they understand who he is and what he did as vice president, and just see more of him, because we haven’t really seen him through his vice presidency.
Among Gallup Recent pollsHe has a 93 percent favorable opinion rating from Democrats, up from 77 percent in June That transfers a pretty defined vibe to her.
Vibe is another way to measure Motivation to voteAnd that has changed. Now it’s the Democrats who are outpacing the Republicans in voting motivation. In the past, the Republicans had a pretty significant lead.
Another factor is anecdotal evidence – the fact that there is such a saturation of coverage of him, whether it’s a lot of positive coverage in the media, MemesJokes about brat summers, coconut trees, or coconut-peeling, all created excitement among young people.
Lavanya Ramanathan
Why are people feeling so strongly now? We hinted at Michelle Obama the last time we saw this power for Barack Obama.
Christian Paz
One of the reasons people are so optimistic about Harris is that they see him as a turnaround candidate, even though he’s technically an incumbent. He is part of the administration. People are willing to forgive some of his ties to Biden and look past some of the more unpopular parts of the Biden presidency and not blame him for it and give him credit for the more popular aspects.
People want to feel that there’s a difference in the air, and that’s why they’re looking back to the closest thing to it: 2008. There are similarities. It’s another black candidate; It’s a female presidential candidate, which reminds us of 2016. So what we’ve created together, I think of it almost like tea, with notes from your past, repackaged for the post-Trump era.
Even if you look beyond the vibe, Harris is up in a few polls in North Carolina, looking to expand the map to Florida, and getting serious about Arizona, which is something we heard about during Obama’s campaign, so it’s a fair comparison.
Lavanya Ramanathan
A comparison we can’t make with Obama who had a few more months to campaign. People quit their jobs to join campaigns and knock on doors. There was not only vibrance, but on-the-ground work. I don’t know that Harris has time to reach that level of voters.
What should people understand about whether vibes will be enough to translate into votes?
Christian Paz
Yes, just as we are wary of polls, we should be wary of vibes. They are vibes. They are formless. They are temporary. I think that’s why it’s important to remember that we’re in a bit of a bubble.
This is a great point given how condensed and condensed this timeline is. We have never had a negative Harris news cycle. Harris has had consistently positive coverage over the past month, and we should be ready to see that change.
There is also a lot of noise voteBut I’ve heard from many pollsters that it’s the opposite of what we’ve seen with Trump voters. They call this response bias, where you have a certain type of voter who wants to be heard and is more likely to be represented at the polls and paints a misleading picture. Which encouraged Trump.
As far as that translating into polls and reality, after we have those caveats, it’s important to remember that Harris is inheriting much of the infrastructure of Biden’s campaign. They have one the bunch money. And indeed, there’s been some political science research that shows that the most effective way to reach a traditional voter is through TV ads and online ads, which is why it’s so important that they have so much money to spend.
The next best way is to get out and talk to people, and luckily, again, the Biden team already has a pretty good infrastructure. They have more campaign offices than the Trump campaign, they’ve set them up in different states and they’re hiring.
We will see how much is knocking on the door.
In the past, there was some question about whether there would be enough Biden volunteers willing to campaign for him. In that sense, vibes matter: we saw one hurry up of volunteer Sign up to help Democrats recently.
This is another way to measure the vibe shift: In a qualitative sense, Harris is making it easier for your volunteers to make a pitch for a candidate.
Lavanya Ramanathan
I’m really curious. What does all this talk of positive energy and vibes about this election obscure?
Christian Paz
There was a lot of tension and disagreement behind the scenes regarding the Gaza protests, with unscheduled delegations. We didn’t see much discussion of this at the convention. [Harris ultimately addressed the conflict and her position in her closing remarks.]
The other thing is that there is still a lot of discontent over the economy and inflation. We haven’t heard much about it at the DNC. Harris is trying to be proactive about these issues but doesn’t necessarily know the best way to talk about them. How much do you want to talk about inflation and remind people that you are part of this administration?
There is still a chance for the economy to take a negative turn in the coming months, and that would be bad for Harris.
The third thing the vibes are obfuscating right now is that, yes, it’s still a really close race. People are pointing out that Trump is still one average polling error away from winning, and a pretty big win.
There are many things that can affect how the party’s liberals are thinking and becoming, which can affect how more moderate and swing-state voters are thinking.
It’s still really, really close, and that’s something people need to remember.
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If you’re interested in more election news — and not just the vibe — check out Vox’s guides to Donald Trump and Donald Trump’s actual policy positions Kamala Harris.
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