Kamala Harris had an advantage in fundraising and campaign mobilization. Yet she got trounced. The lesson is that advertising and organizing doesn't matter in politics, right? Wrong. In the battleground states where she leveraged those resource advantages, Harris underperformed Joe Biden's 2020 results by 1.6 points . In the non-battleground states where she did not meaningfully compete, she underperformed 2020 by 3.9 points . This means that i n the places where the Harris campaign spent money and organized and knocked on doors, she did better.* Duh, it wasn't enough. Yet consider the political environment in 2024 for incumbent parties: across the world this year, each governing party facing election has lost vote share. Every single one. (This is the first time that had ever happened.) No one would suggest that Democrats pat themselves on the back when the result of their efforts is a Donald Trump victory. But look at this chart:** The red dot is the 2024 Democrats, the ...
