The battle between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump enters decisive phase after two successful conventions

A little over a month and 90 miles of distance separated the conventions of the Republican and Democratic parties. In both cases, the conventions ended with a shower of confetti and the release of tens of thousands of balloons in the colours of the American flag — red, white and blue. The scenes would have been virtually interchangeable, if it were not for the enormous golden balloons (Donald Trump’s favorite colour) that were added to the Repbulican balloon drop.

In addition to the staging, both conventions had a similar mood. Hailed as a semi-divine hero who had just survived an assassination attempt and who was clearly polling ahead of his rival — Joe Biden at that time — Donald Trump left the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee convinced that he would win the November 5 presidential election. In a campaign full of dramatic plot twists, the move to name Kamala Harris as presidential candidate a month later brought enthusiasm to the Democratic ranks in Chicago and threw the former president off balance. After two triumphant conventions, just two and a half months of campaigning will decide who will replace Biden in the White House, with the debate on September 10 as the next big event.

Whoever wins will make history in the first election since 1976 in which the surnames Bush, Clinton or Biden will not appear on the ballot. Either Harris becomes the first woman to occupy the Oval Office, or Trump becomes the first president in more than a century to regain office after losing it. The election is seen as choice between two contrasting candidates in which character, personal stories and big ideas are taking center stage to the detriment of specific policy proposals.

The Democrats have not even bothered to update their so-called platform, presenting a document in Chicago that repeatedly talks about what they would do in Biden’s “second term.” Trump, for his part, has rejected the elaborate and ultra-conservative Project 2025, a kind of blueprint for his hypothetical second presidency, drawn up by people close to him, which has been targeted by Democrats. In 2016, Hillary Clinton presented detailed proposals and lost to Trump, who had a one-sentence program: Make America Great Again.

For better or worse, Trump is one of the most recognizable people on the planet. Harris, by contrast, has spent four years in Biden’s shadow. “The bad thing about vice presidents is that nobody knows who you are. The good thing about vice presidents is that nobody knows who you are,” David Axelrod, who was Barack Obama’s chief strategist, said last week in a statement reported by AP. Patrick Gaspard, president of the Center for American Progress, interprets this in a positive light: “She has this powerful and unique and interesting advantage that we have never seen before in our politics. She is both the incumbent, but also a candidate for change,” he said at an event last week in Chicago on the sidelines of the convention.

Harris, 59, used her closing remarks to do three things: attack Trump, appeal for unity (“I promise to be a president for all Americans”) and introduce herself. She recounted her family history — she is the daughter of a Jamaican immigrant and an Indian mother who met at the University of Berkeley — and talked about growing up in a middle-class neighborhood. She reviewed her career as a prosecutor, working “for the people.” Before that, her great-nieces explained how to pronounce her name.

A test for Harris

But Harris has yet to hold a press conference or an in-depth interview — she has promised one for next week — to address questions about her management of these past years, her future plans and her changes of opinion. For example, in her attempt to present herself as a pragmatic and trustworthy leader, Harris has abandoned her opposition to fracking and her proposal for universal health coverage, her flagship measures when she ran in the primaries in 2019.

For the moment, the vice president has not felt the need to subject herself to the media’s questions. She is enjoying a wave of popularity and enthusiasm that was built in just five weeks, a honeymoon period with voters that has boosted her popularity and put her in the lead in many polls.

Polls, however, underestimated Trump in both 2016 and 2020, and the Democrat’s margin is smaller than what both Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden had at this point in the campaign. “We’ve seen more than one election slip away from us when we thought it couldn’t happen, when people got distracted by phony issues, or overconfident,” Bill Clinton said last week in what seemed to be a reference to his wife’s defeat in 2016. “One of the reasons President-to-be Harris is doing so well is we’re all so happy. But you should never underestimate her adversary,” he added. Michelle Obama issued a similar warning: No matter how good we feel tonight, tomorrow or the next day, this is going to be an uphill battle.”

“It’s going to be one of the closest elections in history,” said Democratic strategist Juan Verde, who has been involved in every campaign since 1992. “No candidate can claim victory. There is a technical tie and I think the uncertainty will continue until the last moment,” he added, recalling that it is not the popular vote that decides the winner, but the Electoral College, which benefits the Republicans. According to Verde, the key for Harris in the final stretch of the campaign is to maintain the level of enthusiasm and energy. That depends, he says, on her consolidating a movement similar to the one that brought Obama to the presidency in 2008, so that her message spreads through young people, the media and social networks.

Trump's response

Trump can’t stand being out of the spotlight and last week, he tried to counter-program the Democratic convention with several rallies that the media has not paid much attention to, with the exception of Friday’s event in Glendale, Arizona. The independent Robert F. Kennedy, propagator of hoaxes and conspiracy theories, appeared at the rally to endorse Trump after withdrawing his own candidacy. Although John F. Kennedy’s nephew has a very small following, these elections could be decided by a minimal difference.

Trump tweeted compulsively on his social network, Truth Social, while Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz and Harris gave their convention speeches. On the day of Harris’ speech, he spontaneously called the conservative Fox News channel. The presenters ended up cutting off his somewhat incoherent words, which came with small beeps that seemed to indicate that Trump was inadvertently pressing keys on his phone with his cheek.

The passing of the baton after Biden’s disastrous performance in the June 27 debate has thrown Trump off balance, and he hasn’t yet seemed to find the right angle to attack his new rival. He hasn’t even decided on a nickname for Harris, as he usually does with his rivals (“crooked Hillary,” “crazy Nancy [Pelosi],” “sleepy Joe,” “little Marco [Rubio],” “Ron DeSanctimonious,” “Birdbrain” [for Nikki Haley], and a long list of others that has earned a page on Wikipedia). He has, however, tried out several: “Crazy Kamala,” “Laffin’ Kamala,” “Comrade Kamala,” as he baselessly accuses her of being a communist, or “Kamabla,” apparently for dismissing her message as “blah, blah, blah.”

Although his advisers have advised him to stick to proposals rather than personal attacks, insults come naturally to Trump. He has questioned Harris’ racial identity and called her “lazy.” At one of last week’s rallies in Asheboro, North Carolina, he asked the audience if he should listen to his advisors. The answer was a resounding no. “My advisers… are fired,” he joked, using his catchline from his TV show The Apprentice that launched him to fame.

On the campaign trail, Trump has focused on immigration, promising the biggest deportation operation in the history of the U.S. But he has provided no details about how this will be carried out. Harris, meanwhile, has accused the Republican of opposing a law that would have secured the border.

The Democrat is focusing on access to abortion, while Trump has avoided all mention of it, knowing that the issue could hurt his chances with voters. He posted on X that his presidency will be good for women’s “reproductive rights,” the phrase used by pro-choice activists.

The two have also argued over the economy, with the Republican accusing Harris of being a communist and Harris accusing the Trump of only looking out for the interests of billionaires like himself.

The real battle, however, is over their character and vision of the United States. Harris is appealing to joy and optimism, while Trump is painting an apocalyptic picture of the country and trying to rouse fear and anger. The Republicans portray Harris as a dangerous and incompetent leftist. The Democrats present the former president as a self-centered egotist who only cares about himself and is a threat to democracy. They have also found a new line of attack: presenting both Trump and his vice presidential candidate, J. D. Vance, as “weird.” The Democrats have even delivered some low blows, repeating the false claims that Vance once wrote about having sex with a couch in his memoir.

The election will be decided in six or seven swing states (Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia, Arizona, Nevada and, since Harris’ arrival, North Carolina), which is where the two parties will concentrate their campaign efforts. There are only two and half months to go before the vote, and even less if mail-in voting — which begins on September 6 in North Carolina —, or early voting, — which begins on September 16 in Pennsylvania, the most important state in dispute — is taken into account.

Debate

The next big event is the Sept. 10 debate, which both Harris and Trump have begun preparing for. The Republican has turned to Trump convert Tulsi Gabbard, who upset Harris in a 2019 Democratic primary debate. As Biden knows well, a debate can drastically change the campaign dynamic, and it remains to be seen whether the event in September will be the only showdown between the two candidates.

Harris and Trump have never met in person. The debate will be the first time they have been together in the same space, with the exception of the State of the Union speeches when Trump was president and Harris attended as a senator. Harris, a prosecutor who is used to convincing juries, debated Mike Pence in 2020 and since then, people have been reminded of the way she prevented her rival from interrupting her: “I’m speaking.” Trump is more experienced and has just knocked out Biden from the race (or rather, he knocked himself out).

Trump believed that he had won the election with that debate, but it may end up being the moment he lost it, by facilitating the change in the Democratic ticket. As he said goodbye to Chicago, after assuring that he held no resentment, shortly before boarding Air Force One to go on a two-week vacation with his family to Santa Ynez (California) and Rehoboth Beach (Delaware), Biden was asked if he still believed that he could have defeated Trump in November: “You always think that you could’ve won,” he replied.

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