🗳️ New candidate who dis?

Hi Intriguer. I remember saying to Kristen before we launched Election Intrigue, “I think it’ll be a fairly standard election cycle between two guys we all know pretty well… will there be enough to say each week?”

Yeah… about that. The most consequential debate in presidential history, an assassination attempt, the latest replacement of a nominee in history… maybe pump the brakes a little guys?

This week’s Election Intrigue comes to you a day later than usual because we’ve been running around Washington D.C., talking to our contacts to get a sense of how they think Kamala Harris will change the race.

Because of that, we’re trying a different format for the newsletter this week. Kristen and I recorded a podcast yesterday taking stock of everything we’ve heard, what we make of the Vice President’s chances, and what her foreign policy might look like.

We’ve included a detailed summary of our conversation below, but I urge folks to listen to the full conversation!

- John Fowler & Kristen Talman in Washington D.C

What is Kamala Harris’s foreign policy?

Vice President Kamala Harris has been the Democratic Party’s presumptive nominee for a whopping… checks notes… five days. We weren’t alive in 1968 when President Lyndon Johnson chose not to run again, but from the accounts of those closest to Johnson, it was a more orderly process.

People inside the Democratic Party machine suggest that Joe Biden remains pretty salty about being “forced” out. Jill Biden’s public thanks on Twitter/X “to those who never wavered, to those who refused to doubt” suggests that to be the case, but perhaps we’re reading too much into a nice thank you note…

So what to make of Kamala Harris? Even though she’s been Vice President for nearly four years, her views on foreign policy aren’t widely known. That’s partly because, much like children during the Victorian era, the job of the vice president is to be seen and not heard.

Of course, diplomats worth their salt will already have strong relationships within the Vice President’s office—particularly with Philip Gordon, her National Security Advisor (NSA). Word on the DC streets is he’ll replace current NSA Jake Sullivan if Harris is elected.

So we spent the week talking to diplomats, journalists and other political types this week to get a sense of how they think a Harris administration would differ from a second Biden or Trump administration.

A summary of our conversation:

1. Our contacts unanimously agreed that President Biden’s withdrawal means the election is once again competitive. The ~$130M raised by Harris since Biden withdrew is strong evidence that Trump has a real race on his hands. It’s only been five days, but her energy and presence on the campaign trail have been noticeable, particularly in contrast to President Biden.

2. We discussed the Vice President’s foreign policy experience and what she might do if elected. We got a glimpse of how she views the Israel-Gaza conflict on Thursday, simultaneously condemning the pro-Palestine (and at times pro-Hamas) protests in Washington D.C while telling Benjamin Netanyahu “it is time for this war to end” and that she wouldn’t be silent about the “scale of human suffering in Gaza.” In our opinion, she offered the clearest summary of how the US people view the conflict: “Israel has the right to defend itself, but how it does so matters”. Trump also seems to have adopted this position, signaling he’ll tell Netanyahu to “end the war in Gaza soon” when they meet at Mar-a-Lago today.

3. The reaction from global capitals has so far been muted. Foreign leaders are in a difficult spot — they have a sitting president they must deal with (Biden), a potential president they’d like to forge relations with (Harris), and an ex-president who is still the betting market’s favorite to become president again (Trump). We think Moscow would still prefer a Trump administration but might see a chance to influence Harris to their benefit, while Beijing might prefer Harris for her potentially more negotiable stance towards US-China relations.

4. Beyond that, we think Harris’s foreign policy will essentially follow Biden’s. On questions like NATO, military aid to Ukraine, and America’s role in the world more generally, we’d be shocked if she made big changes before November. If elected, our contacts suggest she will replace the senior foreign policy leadership, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan. If she does, that would be the clearest signal she wants to break from President Biden’s foreign policy.

5. Lastly, even if you are a die-hard Democrat and love Kamala Harris, you’d have to admit the mainstream media's portrayal of her candidacy this week has been nothing short of hagiographic. We discussed whether that’s likely to change, how former President Trump might react, and where we think the presidential race is at now. We all know Kamala Harris can win, but will she?

Listen to the full conversation in your browser by using the audio player above, or by subscribing to our podcast feed below. You can find a full, unedited transcript of our conversation here.

Harris Poll x Intrigue

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Where in the world is…

• President Joe Biden is headed to Camp David after receiving a briefing on artificial intelligence at 2.45pm.

• Secretary of State Antony Blinken is on official travel to Laos, Vietnam, Japan, the Philippines, Singapore, and Mongolia until August 3rd.

• Republican nominee Donald Trump has a morning meeting at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida with Netanyahu scheduled.

• Vice President Kamala Harris is running up against an August 7th deadline to choose a Vice Presidential running mate for the Democratic ticket.

• Deputy Secretary Kurt Campbell is meeting with Maeda Tadashi, the Japan Bank for International Cooperation’s Chairman of the Board at the State Department.

Papers of the world

The VP has joined the race

On Sunday afternoon, President Joe Biden made the announcement that felt weeks in the making: he was stepping aside from the 2024 Presidential Election race. Here’s how the world papers reported the incident —

🇨🇳 What happens next? Four key questions as Biden quits race, endorses Harris - CGTN, Beijing, China

• Intrigue’s take: English-language media out of Beijing had a noticeable lack of coverage about Kamala Harris even though other international papers kept the presumptive nominee on the front pages all week. Beijing is looking for stability and might be willing to wait before printing bold headlines about her.

🇲🇽 Historic US union leader Dolores Huerta supports Kamala Harris' candidacy - El Universal, Mexico City, Mexico

• Intrigue’s take: There was scant coverage of Huerta’s endorsement, an influential voice among Latino voters since the 1960s, in the American-English media, but it could be an important development in the battle for the Latino vote.

🇫🇷 Kamala-mania brings enthusiasm back to Democratic camp - Le Monde, Paris, France

• Intrigue’s take: Kamala-mania, momala, brat-ala. The possibilities are endless, even for the French. And no, we’re not going to explain what any of that is mostly because we don’t quite get it ourselves.

🇮🇳 Could Indian-Americans boost Harris's presidential bid? - The Times of India, Mumbai, India

• Intrigue’s take: JD Vance’s wife Usha is a first-generation Indian-American, and yet Indian media (particularly social media) only had eyes for Kamala this week. If Harris wins, it will be interesting to see how her administration handles Narendra Modi's government.

KAMALA GOES GLOBAL

Thulasendrapuram, a small Indian village nearly 8,700 miles from Washington D.C, is celebrating Harris’s unexpected role as the Democratic Party’s presumptive nominee. Harris’s maternal grandfather hails from the town in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, but the Vice President has only visited once when she was five. That hasn’t stopped residents from cheering her on in the 59-year-old’s rise up the political ranks, even respectfully referring to her as “sister and mother.”

What we’re reading

• ‘Invisible’ Kamala Harris struggles to win over Europe

• House GOP leaders urge members: Stop making race comments about Harris

• JD Vance and the Foreign Policy Election

• A Key Netanyahu Coalition Partner Says Trump Best for Israel

• Kamala Harris tipped to keep Biden’s foreign policy team in place – at least at first

• Shapiro, Kelly and Cooper frontrunners to be Harris’s running mate, say donors

Poll