Hello
Who knew all the Democrats had to do was fire their ailing current president? Well, a lot of people. But few could have predicted how successfully Kamala Harris and Uncle Tim have relentlessly saturated key swing states, spoken to huge crowds and surged in the polls.
Trump, for his part, is babbling, caught somewhere between rage and inertia. The former president held just one campaign event in the last seven days and seems to spend most of his time complaining on his Truth Social website, taking a breather to repeat his pitch to the rich idiot in X. More headlines from Trump’s bad week.
Here’s what you need to know
1. Traditional thinking
Thousands of Democrats will sweep into Chicago next week for the party’s national convention, where Harris will be formally anointed as their nominee for president. Despite the Democrats’ checkered history of holding conventions in Chicago, the event is likely to have a celebratory atmosphere as Harris presents his vision of the United States to a very friendly crowd. Barack Obama will be among the speakers and the Guardian will be there with live updates.
2. Abortion by ballot
Arizona will vote in November on a constitutional amendment to protect the right to abortion, which could boost Democratic turnout in the swing state. “Democrats are hoping that enthusiasm for the measures will boost turnout among their base,” my colleague Carter Sherman writes. In all, voters in at least seven states (including Colorado, Florida, Maryland, Missouri, Nevada and South Dakota) will decide on abortion rights referendums this year.
3. Team rescue
Ilhan Omar, a Minnesota congressman and member of the progressive group “The Squad,” won the primary Tuesday night and is likely to be re-elected to the House in November. Omar defeated Don Samuels, a former Minneapolis councilman, avoiding the fate of fellow Squad members Cori Bush and Jamaal Bowman, who both lost their primaries this year. Pro-Israel lobby groups spent millions to defeat Bush and Bowman after they criticized Israel’s war on Gaza, but even though Omar also criticized Israel’s actions, those groups were left out of the Minnesota primary.
Strategy for being angry on the internet
How about that Harralz speed, eh? Kamala Harris and Tim Walz hit the ground running last week, and they’ve barely stopped since, holding events in five states, weirding people out, and generally reinvigorating previously jaded Democratic bases.
There is evidence that the Harris Vibes tour is paying off, as for the first time in absolute time we’re seeing a poll that shows Trump No to win the election. Before Biden fell, Trump led him by 3.1 percent nationally, and the Republican was ahead in every swing state. Harris now has a slight lead nationally, closing the gap on Trump in places like Michigan and Wisconsin. Each party typically experiences a surge in popularity after its convention, so the momentum is likely to continue — somewhat, anyway.
Judging by Trump’s suddenness, it’s clear he’s worried. But it’s less clear what Trump is actually doing to counter Harris’ rise. While Harris and Walz have been twirling the stage in front of thousands of people, Trump seems to have mostly just sat in the private members’ club in Florida that he calls home.
In the past week, the former president has chatted with Elon Musk at X, hosted a rambling press conference in Florida, ranted incessantly on Truth Social and held just one campaign rally in a non-election state. Oh, and it also turned out that Trump has been traveling around the country on the former plane of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, something Republicans would be talking about if the Democratic nominee had done.
Trump’s conversation with Musk on Tuesday was supposed to give his campaign a shot in the arm — a nice scratch with a friendly ally. But when the debate began — after a 40-minute delay due to technical difficulties — people’s main thoughts were a) this is very boring and b) why is Trump mincing his words? Indeed, he seemed to struggle with pronouncing the “s” in several words, with the term “grocery” proving particularly problematic. His campaign initially denied there was a problem — “it’s got to be your ear,” a spokesman said — though Trump later blamed “modern devices and cell phone technology.” Still, for a man with a long history of mocking perceived physical weakness, the conversation hasn’t been a welcome one.
The internet’s angry strategy has not typically proven to win elections
To make matters worse, Trump’s admiring comments about Musk firing workers prompted the United Auto Workers union to file a federal labor lawsuit. Trump did not address that in more than 20 posts he posted on his own social media website Tuesday, though he described Harris as a “joke,” complained about the vote and at one point declared, “I HATE the fake news media.” With the exception of 2016, the strategy of getting angry on the Internet has not typically proven to be a winner in elections.
But Harris supporters know that Election Day on Nov. 5 is a long way off (although in some states people can start voting in September). The pace certainly won’t last. He and Walz are fresh faces right now, but Republicans are spending hundreds of millions attacking them, and Trump is sure to come out of his bunker eventually.
CNN pollster Harry Enten noted Tuesday that Trump was underrated in polls in 2016 and 2020, saying Trump’s popularity among Americans was higher than in those two elections. So nothing has been decided yet – but the Democrats have at least several reasons to be optimistic.
Outside: New Orleans
The Guardian joined Joe Biden on Air Force One on Tuesday en route to New Orleans, where the president handed out millions in new research grants for a policy he created after his eldest son, Beau, died of brain cancer at age 46.
“We know that all families touched by cancer are in a race against time,” Biden said at Tulane University.
Now that Biden is no longer running for re-election, he appears to be devoting the final months of his presidency to his passion projects, including promoting his “month-long” cancer-fighting initiative.
Lie of the week: Sea level rise is good
The sea “will only rise an eighth of an inch in the next 400 years” and will create “more oceanfront property anyway,” Donald Trump claimed to Elon Musk on Tuesday.
He was definitely wrong the first time. According to NASA, the average global sea level has risen a total of about 4 inches in the last 30 years alone. And the growth rate is accelerating.
And while more beachfront property can indeed be created, a lot current seaside property will not survive: rising sea levels will hit low-lying coastal areas the worst.
