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Can Kamala charm swing voters? Most of them have already fallen for Trump

'Kamala’s smile, passion and inspiring story may not be enough.' Julia Beverly/Getty Images

'Kamala’s smile, passion and inspiring story may not be enough.' Julia Beverly/Getty Images


October 1, 2024   7 mins

Never have two American presidential candidates been so different from one another. The Black-Indian daughter of Left-wing academics versus the white son of a wealthy Ku Klux Klan sympathiser. The woman who spent her entire career in public service versus the man who only left the private sector on the day of his 2017 inauguration. The life-long liberal Democrat versus the ideological shapeshifter who finally gravitated to the extreme Right. The candidate supported by nearly two-thirds of all college-educated voters versus the one supported by nearly two-thirds of non-college-educated whites. The conventional politician versus the insurrectionist who broke the American political mould.

While Donald Trump and Kamala Harris are both frequently described as “charismatic”, they clearly have very different sorts of charismatic appeal. And this “charisma divide” helps explain why Harris, despite her almost flawless performance since replacing Joe Biden as the Democratic nominee — uniting the party behind her, staging a close-to-perfect convention, and besting Trump in the 10 September debate — has had such difficulty pulling ahead in a presidential race that still stands on a knife edge. A comparison with Barack Obama’s victorious 2008 campaign is illuminating in this regard: a part of the electorate that saw Obama as charismatic and attractive in 2008 does not feel the same way about Harris 16 years later.

This difference is not just a matter of the candidates, for charisma is not just a personality trait — the ability to attract, charm and inspire others. It is more properly understood as a social relationship, an intense emotional bond forged between an individual and a community of admirers. Different communities find different things charismatic, and, depending on their political and cultural leanings, often dismiss as “fake” in one person the qualities they find deeply attractive and inspiring in another. Between 2008 and 2024, it is not just the candidates who have changed. So has the electorate.

Donald Trump, love him or hate him, has by any measure succeeded in forging the most intense charismatic bond with his supporters of any American politician in recent memory — perhaps, of any in history. Part of the reason is that he projects an image of strength — even if it is the strength of a bully, and mostly false. He also knows, instinctively, how to reach supporters in their own language. Elite commentators mock Trump for his garbled syntax and spelling, for his love of crude insults, for his language of “us versus them”. They compare him with the proverbial drunk uncle ranting at the holiday table. But, of course, many people have ranting relatives. You may not take them seriously, but they are still family. And social media only heightens the sense of familiarity that Trump instils — and that is crucial to the charismatic bond — because their feeds deliberately mix posts from politicians with ones from family members and friends. Trump fits right into the feed in a way that most Democratic politicians have failed to do. Harris sounds like a politician on social media. Trump does not.

Most important — and this is a point that elite commentators generally miss — Trump’s charismatic bond with his supporters is reinforced, rather than shaken, by his constant outrages: his lying, his law-breaking, his racism, his threats of violence. The point is not whether his supporters believe him, take him seriously, or are ready to follow him in an attack on democracy. The point is that he so flagrantly, and joyfully, breaks the rules of American society and politics, again and again. For men and women who believe that those rules are rigged against them by corrupt and feckless elites, this behaviour is thrilling. The fact that Trump is transgressing matters far more than the particular rules being transgressed.

Of course, the hard core of MAGA supporters who feel the bond most intensely amounts only to a minority of the electorate, concentrated among whites with non-elite educations — although not just struggling ones (if one paradigmatic Trump voter is an unemployed factory worker on disability, another is a successful car dealer). But the elections of 2016 and 2020 have both shown that plenty of other Americans are sufficiently tolerant of Trump and receptive to his message to keep the presidential election agonisingly close.

Which brings us to Kamala Harris, and her brand of charisma. In most ways, it is much more conventional than Trump’s, in line with that of Democratic politicians going back to John F. Kennedy. Harris is unquestionably glamorous: a beautiful woman who dresses elegantly if not extravagantly and has a 500-watt smile. She speaks passionately and inspiringly about the subjects she cares about the most. During her debate with Trump, she was hesitant, even floundering for the first 15 minutes, and then came a question about abortion. In a moment, her voice grew stronger, her sentences more fluid, her emotions came to the fore. And as she gained confidence, she began to needle Trump more effectively, bringing the ranting uncle to the surface. Among her supporters, her gender and racial background are also, inescapably, central to her charismatic appeal. For voters who appreciate the continuing power of sexism and racism in American society, Harris’s story is naturally seen as that most instinctively appealing of narratives: the triumph of the underdog. But at the same time, most voters see Harris, with her long career in politics, as a member of the American elite — far more than Trump, the perennial angry outsider despite his vast fortune.

“Most voters see Harris, with her long career in politics, as a member of the American elite — far more than Trump, the perennial angry outsider despite his vast fortune.”

Harris has done an excellent job of exciting her base of supporters, but, overall, her support remains softer than Trump’s. Trump’s charismatic appeal has, by this point, turned the MAGA movement into a cult. He can do and say virtually anything, and his supporters will not desert him. The Democratic Party is a more normal political party. Members of its progressive wing support Harris, but also distrust her recent shifts towards the centre on economic policy, on immigration, on foreign policy in general (where she is hawkish in a way reminiscent of Hillary Clinton), and especially on Israel-Palestine. Put simply, Harris’s support is less stable than Trump’s. She has the tricky job of holding onto her base, while convincing the small number of centrist swing voters left in the swing states that she is not a madly woke socialist. This is what will decide the election. So far, she has accomplished the first task (thanks to the perceived danger of Trump and the lack of credible Left-wing alternatives) but not the second.

Harris’s challenge is similar to that of the only other person of colour to have received a presidential nomination (and another unquestioned member of the American elite): Barack Obama. Her charismatic appeal is also similar to his, as a (relatively) young, fresh, inspiring person of colour who has overcome great odds to rise to the top of the American political system. Obama is a far better orator than Harris, but Harris does better than Obama in personal interactions with voters. She has an instinctive ease and sympathy that Obama often seems to lack (he moves too easily into lecture mode). If I have one serious criticism of the Harris campaign so far, it is that it has not done nearly enough to highlight this side of the candidate, most likely out of fear that a verbal flub or mistake might go viral — and Harris is indeed prone to such moments. She has been criticised as well for her changes of position over the years, and her lack of specific policy proposals, but these are charges that could be levelled against most American politicians, and, in any case, Trump is far worse on both scores. But Harris should be doing town halls, and sit-downs with ordinary voters at every possible opportunity, and she is not.

This is not the only reason why Harris, despite everything she has done right, has been unable to reach beyond her base and pull ahead of Trump in the polls. Many things have changed in America since 2008, and there are simply no longer many white swing voters left who might be swayed by Harris’s charisma — almost certainly fewer than was the case with Obama.

The problem, then, is not Harris’s lack of charisma, but a change in her audience. For one thing, populist distrust and resentment has grown far stronger than it was in 2008, turning many more voters against any candidate perceived as elite. In 2008, Obama carried Ohio, Indiana and Iowa, three midwestern states whose white working-class populations had already suffered strongly from the loss of factory jobs. These jobs have mostly not returned. In addition, Republicans have worked hard to present immigration as the principal cause of social decline and as a threat. In Indiana and Iowa, the percentage of foreign-born residents has doubled, or close to it, since 2008. In Ohio — where Trump and his running mate J.D. Vance have lied about Haitian immigrants eating household pets — it has gone up by 50%. Perhaps not surprisingly, all three states are now firmly in the Republican column. A large number of white voters in these states — even those without elite education — still saw Obama as charismatic 16 years ago. They don’t see Kamala Harris in the same way. The same factors challenge her in other swing states, especially all-crucial Pennsylvania (a state which, as a friend of mine quips, consists of Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and “Pennsyltucky”).

Secondly, the partisan political divide in the US has petrified to an almost unbelievable extent, not only because of Trump, but because of the Republican Party more generally, and also a changed media environment. Soon after Obama’s inauguration in 2009, anger at Washington for not punishing the finance industry for the previous year’s financial crisis led to the birth of the “Tea Party”: the direct ancestor of Trumpism in its conservative nationalist populism, and its scorn for the niceties of American political life. In the House of Representatives, Tea Party members adopted scorched-earth policies towards the Obama administration, exciting their supporters, defeating perceived “RINOs” (“Republicans in Name Only”) in primary elections, and forcing the entire party to double down on the obstructionist brand of political total warfare first pioneered by Newt Gingrich in the Nineties. Meanwhile, Fox News expanded its influence and inspired imitators (notably the Sinclair group of local TV stations). Social media, still in its infancy in 2008 (Facebook was four years old that year; Twitter, two) grew into a behemoth. More than ever, today, Americans live in media bubbles, reading only heavily partisan stories that reinforce their existing opinions. For this reason as well, there are simply far fewer white voters than in 2008 who can be swayed by the charismatic appeal of a candidate like Obama or Harris, and these are the voters Harris needs to win.

And finally, Obama had one massive advantage that Harris lacks: he was running as the insurgent, against a Republican Party that had presided over a disastrous war and, in the fall of 2008, a terrifying economic collapse. His very simple campaign message — “change” — met the moment and drew enough swing voters to give him a powerful victory.

Kamala Harris cannot exactly run a “change” campaign. Yes, her core supporters hate Donald Trump even more than they hated George W. Bush. Trump’s own record in office — despite his absurd and mendacious boasts — was marked above all by his disastrous handling of the worst American health emergency in a century. Democrats don’t want him back and will turn out in large numbers to say so on 5 November, and this matters. But in the country at large, memories of the Trump administration’s failures have faded, and Joe Biden’s apparent inability to contain inflation has cast Trump’s good luck with the economy in a retrospective golden glow (in fact, the Biden administration dealt with what was a world-wide post-pandemic phenomenon far better than almost any other nation, but no matter — Americans don’t pay attention to foreign news).

And so, in an America where membership of “the elite” has become more politically toxic than ever, where Trump’s rule-breaking gains a sneaking sympathy from more people than ever, and where the political divide seems set in granite, Kamala Harris’s smile, passion and inspiring story may not be enough to get her over the top. It is Donald Trump’s brand of charisma that may yet win the day.


David A. Bell is a history professor at Princeton with a particular interest in the political culture of Enlightenment and revolutionary France. His latest book is Men on Horseback: The Power of Charisma in the Age of Revolution.

DavidAvromBell

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Johann Strauss
Johann Strauss
14 days ago

One really has to wonder about the mental sanity of Professor Bell. if he wants to make any sort of case about Harris, perhaps he needs to temper the hyperbole about Trump in his opening paragraph which is sheer popycock. One wonders how Prof. Bell even managed to get tenure if the quality of his research is anywhere close to that manifested in this article.

Jerry Carroll
Jerry Carroll
14 days ago
Reply to  Johann Strauss

You must not know how easy it is to get tenure if you are on the proper side of the ideological divide. On some campuses it is impossible to find anyone who is not a Democrat and rather zealous about it.

Bret Larson
Bret Larson
14 days ago
Reply to  Johann Strauss

The people reviewing his work are just as biased.

Hugh Bryant
Hugh Bryant
13 days ago
Reply to  Johann Strauss

I can understand his desperation. He’s a professor at Princeton. You don’t get much more ruling class than that. Trump represents the end of everything he stands for. The irony is that that end is coming anyway. If we didn’t have universities we wouldn’t invent them. We have the Internet.

Ex Nihilo
Ex Nihilo
14 days ago

What a load of garbage. Is someone actually paying this author to write this crap? Both Harris and Trump have about as much charisma as a colostomy bag and whichever of them wins will be elected by voters holding their noses and trying to triangulate the lesser of two evils. The weird bottom line is that Nikki Haley, who for reasons defying logic is no longer in the race, would have mopped the floor with Harris.

Johann Strauss
Johann Strauss
14 days ago
Reply to  Ex Nihilo

This comment is silly too. There is absolutely no question, like him or hate him, that Trump has charisma in spades. Harris, on the other hand, is a complete and utter airhead. As for Nikki Hailey, she was not without baggage, especially since she is a neocon forever war type.

Ex Nihilo
Ex Nihilo
14 days ago
Reply to  Johann Strauss

Charisma in spades my ass. Anyone who believes Trump is charismatic is silly. The guy is a buffoon to all but his small undereducated knuckle-dragging base. He is a contender only because many centrists, who otherwise find him disgusting, are so terrified of the progressive Left machine that they would vote for anyone not a Democrat. My point is not that Nikki Haley is the reincarnation of Winston Churchill. My point is that THE POLLS HAVE ALL INDICATED SHE WOULD HAVE BEATEN HARRIS IN A LANDSLIDE. That is a paradox that speaks volumes to the perversity of American politics at this moment. Get it?

Chris Maille
Chris Maille
13 days ago
Reply to  Ex Nihilo

the only problem is that nikki haley is part of the same elite that stands for corporate fascism as harris. they are like tweedledee and tweedledum
trump on the other hand stands for true american ideals, which are freedom and self determination. just look at who supports harris and who supports trump. faceless bureaucrats vs all star team.

Alex Lekas
Alex Lekas
13 days ago
Reply to  Ex Nihilo

In reality, he’s a contender because the status quo is effed up beyond belief. The professional political class that comprises the uniparty is what makes Trump even possible, let alone electable.

Martin M
Martin M
14 days ago
Reply to  Johann Strauss

The fact that Haley would have bean a Reagan/Bush style of President is what I liked about her.

Peter B
Peter B
13 days ago
Reply to  Martin M

Not sure I see the similarity between Reagan and Bush (assume you meant Bush I). The US electorate certainly noticed there was a difference.

Martin M
Martin M
13 days ago
Reply to  Peter B

.

Martin M
Martin M
13 days ago
Reply to  Peter B

Reagan and Bush I were quite different personally, but I always saw Bush I’s Presidency as “Reagan’s third term”. I guess the electorate did too.

Stephanie Surface
Stephanie Surface
13 days ago
Reply to  Martin M

Bush I or II? Both of them were very different to Reagan. Bush I fell on his sword when he said: “Read my lips No New Taxes” and continued in his first year of office signing into law a “stealth budget”. Many conservatives/ libertarians left the GOP and voted for Perot the next term , making it possible for Clinton to win. Bush II was an establishment candidate and neocon war monger. Nothing like Reagan, although during his term he had the very disappointing contra affair…. Voters are totally disillusioned with another Bush like candidate. With all his flaws, Trump wants to smash the Washington Elite, stop the Great Green Scam, get the economy going again and stop the endless foreign wars.

Martin M
Martin M
13 days ago

To me, Reagan’s greatest achievement was winning the Cold War without having to resort to any shooting. Even I thought the collapse of the Belin Wall might lead to a better world, but then along came Putin.

James S.
James S.
13 days ago
Reply to  Martin M

If referring to Bush II you mean a neocon who would manage decline just a bit slower than the Dems. And get us into another war to juice the military-industrial complex. Haley is no Reagan.

Martin M
Martin M
13 days ago
Reply to  James S.

I was referring to Bush I. Bush II seemed to be a nice enough guy, but not all that smart. He did go to war in Iraq though, so he wasn’t all bad.

Geoff W
Geoff W
13 days ago
Reply to  Johann Strauss

If Trump has charisma, then why (by your own account) do people hate him? He couldn’t even win the popular vote in 2016 or 2020.
There’s a big difference between charisma, which implies impressing almost everybody, and the ability to impress a significant minority of morons (whether those morons are conservative or liberal).

steve eaton
steve eaton
13 days ago
Reply to  Geoff W

You give yourselves away every time. I am thinking it is nearly impossible for the Progressives to comment on anything Trump without somehow name calling and insulting those who don’t hate Trump.
It’s strange to me because I don’t feel like a “knuckledragger”, moron, or Nazi. I feel more like an electrical engineer, Grandfather, and middle class American citizen.

Martin M
Martin M
13 days ago
Reply to  Geoff W

The way I would answer your question is this: Lets say that Ron DeSantis (to pick another right leaning politician at random) had run for President in 2016, and Trump had not done so. Let’s also say this “2016 DeSantis” had adopted every policy that Trump adopted, and had given every speech that Trump gave. Would he have won? I don’t think he would have got anywhere near winning, because he still would have been DeSantis, not Trump.

Geoff W
Geoff W
13 days ago
Reply to  Martin M

You’re arguing that Trump is a more saleable politician than de Santis and others. That may be so, but I don’t think it’s the same thing as having “charisma in spades,” which was the term I was challenging.
Again, if he had charisma in the sense of mass appeal, he wouldn’t have lost the popular vote twice. Nobody is arguing that Hillary and Joe have charisma.
And I think that in your other-than-Trump scenario, the Republicans would still get at least 40% of the votes cast, even if they lost.

Martin M
Martin M
12 days ago
Reply to  Geoff W

There is no getting away from the fact that Trump has that “X-factor” that few politicians have (and I say that as someone who is no friend of his at all). If he didn’t, he would have never occupied the White House. I mean, if you gave Trump’s resume to someone who had never heard of him in 2015, and asked if he should run for President, the answer would be “No, he has no chance at all”. Conversely, the same person on seeing Hillary’s resume would probably say “Yes, she’d be a perfect President”. However, it wasn’t about resume’s. Trump had charisma. Hillary didn’t.

Martin M
Martin M
14 days ago
Reply to  Ex Nihilo

I hate Trump, but even I would accept that he has bags of charisma. I would have been happy if Nikki Haley had become President. I even bought one of her t-shirts (and I live in Australia).

steve eaton
steve eaton
13 days ago
Reply to  Martin M

You and what’s left of the collapsed Neocon party.

Martin M
Martin M
13 days ago
Reply to  steve eaton

The world was a better place when the Neocons ran the US.

Hans Daoghn
Hans Daoghn
13 days ago
Reply to  Martin M

Now the U.S. leaves the dirty work to Bibi and Zelensky.
Go Bibi!
“From the Liver to the Knee, for Peace through Victory, call Bibi.”

Martin M
Martin M
12 days ago
Reply to  Hans Daoghn

Ok, maybe they should always have done that, but there’s no getting away from the fact that Iran (and its proxies) and Russia need to be dealt with.

Jerry Carroll
Jerry Carroll
14 days ago

“The Black-Indian daughter of Left-wing academics versus the white son of a wealthy Ku Klux Klan sympathiser.” Two falsehoods in a single sentence! That’s impressive even for an Ivy League professor and no need to read further. Kamala’s parents were Marxists and the Charleston protest angle, promoted by the deep state arm called the legacy media, has been thoroughly discredited. Good people on both sides is what Trump said, including those who were opposed to rubbing out history in the interest of forever promoting victimhood.

Geoff W
Geoff W
13 days ago
Reply to  Jerry Carroll

What’s your evidence that Harris’s parents were Marxists?
The article says that Trump’s FATHER was a KKK sympathiser, not Trump himself.

T Bone
T Bone
14 days ago

This is embarrassing. It’s almost like the professorial class has no idea that it’s just parroting propaganda. They truly know not what they do. This should be presented to a Museum so that future generations can study the Absent Minded Professor. The observations here make no effort to be objective. It’s as if the entire concept of objectivity has been transcended by the utility of joyful vibes.

Harris is an actor. Thay want her to be a figurehead that unlike Biden can fill the role of a cultural ambassador. The Democrat Party no longer believes the Executive Branch should be led by one person but by a committee of “experts.” Nobody cares what Harris’ ideas are because she doesn’t have ideas. Ask a Harris voter what she believes in and its almost certain they’ll revert to a TDS diatribe.

Don’t buy the “educated voters” narrative. Most of the “educated voters” have fake degrees and are demanding “debt relief” from the government as we speak.

J Bryant
J Bryant
14 days ago
Reply to  T Bone

Excellent comment.

Bret Larson
Bret Larson
14 days ago
Reply to  T Bone

Yes you can sure tell what the democrats really care about. Giving money to their base is all they care about.

Alex Lekas
Alex Lekas
13 days ago
Reply to  T Bone

I disagree with one point – they do know what they’re doing. Kamala didn’t sneak up on anyone. She’s the same person Dems rejected in 2020 and saw as a liability right up to when Joe was pushed out.

Barry Dank
Barry Dank
7 days ago
Reply to  T Bone

Yes, Harris is an actor, but she is acting along with all the other political actors in the theater of the absurd. As for charisma, it is all a charade, the charade being carried out in front of the omnipresent cameras.

Right-Wing Hippie
Right-Wing Hippie
14 days ago

We’re talking about Kamala Harris, right?

Sylvia Volk
Sylvia Volk
14 days ago

Ms. Harris has charisma? That’s funny, I thought what she had was a plethora of reporters suddenly chanting, “Charisma charisma beauty joy …” Weren’t those the same media folks who kept saying Biden was sharp as a tack?

Right-Wing Hippie
Right-Wing Hippie
14 days ago
Reply to  Sylvia Volk

Which end of the tack?

J Bryant
J Bryant
14 days ago

Ha ha.

UnHerd Reader
UnHerd Reader
13 days ago
Reply to  Sylvia Volk

My sentiments exactly! Good one!
Which rock does this author hide under?

Jim Veenbaas
Jim Veenbaas
14 days ago

What explains the author’s bizarre assessment of Harris as being charismatic? Willful blindness? Motivated reasoning?

She displays zero charisma. She always comes across as an actress playing a part. You never get the sense that she is being real – that she is engaging in a real conversation, as opposed to reading a script. She actually reminds me a lot of Justin Trudeau. They both seem fake.

Trump is many things and there is wild disagreement about his character, but at least he’s authentic. He doesn’t pretend to be something he’s not. The author clearly has a case of TDS, but he doubles down on his delusion by describing Harris as charismatic. She is superficial and voters can smell that a mile away.

Laurian Boer
Laurian Boer
11 days ago
Reply to  Jim Veenbaas

Maybe the author is simply in love with Ms Harris and, as we all know, love is blind.
That’s the only explanation I could find.

Barry Dank
Barry Dank
7 days ago
Reply to  Jim Veenbaas

How do you know Trump is authentic? He might very well be a great actor in projecting authenticity. I do not know. Your knowing is sheer speculation.

Martin M
Martin M
14 days ago

Good story. I often wonder what will happen to the Republican Party post-Trump (and that day will come – even his most fervent supporters don’t think he is immortal, and he is in his late 70s). Various people are mentioned as his ideological successors, but even the most capable of them are but pale shadows of him. In order to sustain a personality cult, you need a personality. Trump certainly has one (for better or worse), but Ron DeSantis (to give an example) doesn’t.

T Bone
T Bone
14 days ago
Reply to  Martin M

Your worldview is confusing. Its unclear what traits you admire in a leader?

Martin M
Martin M
14 days ago
Reply to  T Bone

There are many, but “not being a pathological liar”, and “not being a convicted felon” would be up near the top. I guess “not being best buddies with warmongering dictators” would rate too.

Graham Stull
Graham Stull
13 days ago
Reply to  Martin M

So, once again: it boils down to TDS.

Martin M
Martin M
13 days ago
Reply to  Graham Stull

Well, this “TDS” thing that seems to afflict a lot of people is something that Trump brought on himself.

T Bone
T Bone
13 days ago
Reply to  Martin M

I don’t think any of those traits actually apply to Trump but I understand Anti-Trump sentiment. The DeSantis disdain is a bit more puzzling because his “charisma” while not electric is still better than most politicians like say a Romney or McCain.

There has to be some DeSantis policy or you don’t like the group he represents. I’m guessing it’s more the latter.

Martin M
Martin M
13 days ago
Reply to  T Bone

It is fair to say that before he threw his hat into the Presidential ring, I had barely heard of DeSantis (as I have said, I live in Australia, and don’t really follow US politics at the State level). Beyond a few COVID-related things, and that weird fight with Disney, I have little idea of what DeSantis has done as Governor of Florida. However, since the Primaries started, he is probably the US politician I have come to dislike most (excluding Trump, but he was a “known quantity” by then). If I were to sum him up, it would “whiny-assed, thin skinned ‘small man’ without an ounce of personality or charisma”. The fact that he appears to wear lifts in his boots pretty much sums him up for me. By way of comparison, I acquired a fair but of respect for Nikki Haley.

Jim Veenbaas
Jim Veenbaas
13 days ago
Reply to  Martin M

Calling MAGA a cult is unserious. Trump is not a unique figure, occupying some singular space in the world. There are literally a dozen Trumps across the globe – in Argentina, El Salvador, Austria, France, Germany, Italy etc. The populist movement will carry on once Trump is gone.

Martin M
Martin M
13 days ago
Reply to  Jim Veenbaas

See, I don’t think so. There are any number of “populists” in any number of places, but there is only one Trump. You occasionally get wannabe-Trumps, but they mostly don’t make the grade. Bolsonaro in Brazil was one, but he just didn’t have the personality. When he lost his reelection bid, and tried to “go Trumpy”, other senior members of his party told him it was over and get out of office.

Jim Veenbaas
Jim Veenbaas
13 days ago
Reply to  Martin M

What are you talking about? Geert Wilders in the Netherlands is an oddball. Javier Milei in Argentina is an oddball. These two have been around a lot longer than Trump. All of these populists are unique in their own right, but they all share the same contempt for the incompetent ruling elite. And the response has been the same in every country – they are called racist, misogynist and dire threats to democracy. Wake up and look around. If it wasn’t Trump in the U.S., there would be someone else.

Stephanie Surface
Stephanie Surface
13 days ago
Reply to  Jim Veenbaas

Javier Milei likes Trump, but his political philosophy is quite different. I would say he is a flamboyant version of Ron Paul.

Jim Veenbaas
Jim Veenbaas
13 days ago

He is very much different than Trump because the issues Argentina is grappling with are very much different than America, just as the issues are very much different for Nayib Bukele in El Salvador. Each populist leader and populist movement is unique to each country, but they all share opposition to a political and technocratic elite that is incompetent and unfit for purpose.

Martin M
Martin M
13 days ago
Reply to  Jim Veenbaas

I can’t say I know anything about the El Salvador guy, but most populist politicians have a “political philosophy”. To the extent Trump has a “political philosophy”, it can be summed up as “Trump”.

Jim Veenbaas
Jim Veenbaas
10 days ago
Reply to  Martin M

Virtually none of them have a political philosophy. Gobsmacking comment.

Martin M
Martin M
13 days ago

Agree. He is a radical politician, but he has levels to him that go beyond pure narcissism (unlike Trump).

Martin M
Martin M
13 days ago
Reply to  Jim Veenbaas

Neither of those people are Trump (and Wilders isn’t going to be the leader of the Netherlands any time soon). “Being an oddball” is not the same as “being Trump”. Trump (viewed from a distance) isn’t even that much of an oddball. He seems (in a superficial sense) quite “normal”. I guess that is how he came to be elected President.

Katharine Eyre
Katharine Eyre
14 days ago

Never have two American presidential candidates been so different from one another.”
I beg to differ, I think they are just one letter different. One’s a blithering idiot, the other’s a blathering idiot.

Alex Lekas
Alex Lekas
13 days ago
Reply to  Katharine Eyre

There is one big difference the professor wants you to ignore – the two have records. Compare things during Trump’s time with the present-day. How many people are better off today than they were four years ago?

Samuel Ross
Samuel Ross
13 days ago
Reply to  Katharine Eyre

How about you, Katherine? Perfect, wise, thoughtful, just?

Pequay
Pequay
14 days ago

What sycophantic and inaccurate drivel. The writer could’ve saved his and our time by saying ‘Kamala good, Trump bad’.

Su Mac
Su Mac
13 days ago

This guy also thinks Biden handled the pandemic better than most other countries. And Americans would know that if they would only read European news! FFS!

The trouble with these non-compliant people is they base their opinions on what is actually happening to them not what the newspapers are telling them. (Irony alert)

An interesting if queasy making glimpse inside the Dem bubble – am hoping November is hoping to break his TDS afflicted heart frankly…

Hugh Bryant
Hugh Bryant
13 days ago

It’s magnificent really, isn’t it: the lengths that these guys will go to convince themselves that Harris, possibly the most vacuous politician that the US has produced, is some kind of star?

Peter B
Peter B
13 days ago

Just skimmed the first few paras and realised this should be redirected straight to Private Eye for an OBN (if the Order of the Brown Nose still exists there).

G Lux
G Lux
13 days ago

Unherd’s endless parade of TDS-suffering opinion pieces on the US elections is starting to look very herd-like. Disappointing.

Hans Daoghn
Hans Daoghn
13 days ago
Reply to  G Lux

Ooo. That hurt. (as truth often does)

Peter B
Peter B
13 days ago

My “this is OBN material” comment seems to have been held up …

Peter B
Peter B
13 days ago
Reply to  Peter B

Let’s see if I can rebuild the comment here piece by piece …
There used to be a Private Eye column specifically for this sort of writing. Having spotted immediately what this was, I didn’t get beyond the cringe first few paragraphs.

Chris Maille
Chris Maille
13 days ago

stopped reading this conceited piece of nonsense after the second sentence, glazed over the next few sentences and decided to skip the rest and go straight to the comments.

Mona Malnorowski
Mona Malnorowski
13 days ago

I’m happy to encounter views diametrically opposed to my own (which this writer apparently has, at least about the execrable Kamala), but I’d at least expect a bit more bile and cynicism when discussing the machinery of politics rather than this tepid, conformist non-article? I get the impression the author thinks he is being ‘objective’ or maybe even ‘broadminded’ by mentioning some of Trump’s political strengths, but all I read is a great big left-wing Party Line being toe’d. All very “Herd”.

Daniel Lee
Daniel Lee
13 days ago

“Harris sounds like a politician on social media. Trump does not.”
That’s because she is a politician, and Trump is not. Ordinary people love that.

Alex Lekas
Alex Lekas
13 days ago

Right up to the moment that Biden was shoved out the door, Kamala was to Joe what Joe had been to Obama. Now she’s suddenly a combination of Cicero, George Washington, and a few others. Please stop. Until June, Harris was widely seen – by Dems – as a liability. For reasons that become increasingly obvious, even to an Ivy League professor like this author, with each pathetic attempt at an “interview.”
I have to admit that the “klan sympathizer” sophistry is a new one. It’s usually “he’s literal Hitler” and similar idiocy, but after two assassination attempts, this must be what passes for toning down the rhetoric on the left. But if we’re going to go that way, the professor left out the Marxist angle about Harris’ dad.

Michael Askew
Michael Askew
13 days ago

“The woman who spent her entire career in public service”! As a generality, Kamala Harris has served her own interests, not not the public’s.
“Harris, despite her almost flawless performance since replacing Joe Biden as the Democratic nominee…” Unbelievable!
KH has declined all interviews except ones where she will be given softball questions and never asked for policy details. Thus Dana Bash intervewed JD Vance with a hostility and rudeness that was embarrassing and unprofessional, She then “interviewed” Kamala Harris with a kid gloved determination to avoid exposing the Vice President’s emptiness and ignorance. Kamala Harris may be intelligent – it’s impossible to tell. Her own staff leak stories of her refusing to learn the briefs she is given, and then blaming the staff when she is exposed as knowing nothing. This is why her staff turnover in the VP role is nearly 100%.

James S.
James S.
13 days ago
Reply to  Michael Askew

These days, I think that spending one’s entire career in public service is a damn good reason to vote against that person.

Benedict Waterson
Benedict Waterson
13 days ago

Very woke

Amelia Melkinthorpe
Amelia Melkinthorpe
13 days ago

Unadulterated drivel.

Cho Jinn
Cho Jinn
13 days ago

Whoa, this is some Class-A trolling from Unherd. If asked whether Harris had any charisma, Hillary Clinton would dodge it. If Bell actually believes his Harris observations here, David Icke was right and the lizard people took over back in the 90s.

steve eaton
steve eaton
13 days ago

I knew that this article was a hit piece on Trump when he refers to him as an “insurrectionist”. I am sure that he honestly believe that, but no one believes that except for the fellow travelers.This author is so completely in the tank that I could not read past the part where he compares Harris to Kennedy. …The man is clearly an idiot and a propagandist.

Erik Hildinger
Erik Hildinger
13 days ago

This is an important essay for Unherd readers. It’s important to know that there are many people, even those with ostensibly good formal educations, who believe what Prof. Bell believes.

Tom D.
Tom D.
13 days ago

What kind of weed are they smoking at Princeton these days?

Tom D.
Tom D.
13 days ago

Comparing Kamala and JFK?! How high are you? And glamorous? Sure Kamala Harris is glamorous in the way Californian’s tend to be: provincially, with too much money and total lack of style, grace, and class.
Perhaps you should pull your head out of the a$$ that is NJ and travel to Madrid, Paris, or Milan…?

Hans Daoghn
Hans Daoghn
13 days ago
Reply to  Tom D.

Harris’ fans believe she is a Profile in Courage. Didn’t you know she was on PT-109 with JFK?

Cathy Carron
Cathy Carron
13 days ago

There’s so much hogwash in this essay. In no one’s imagination is Kamala ‘charismatic’. She dropped out of her own Presidential bid because she got ZIP attraction from the electorate. The only reason she’s is her position now is that she was placed there by party elders – no one put her there, no one voted for her, she never participated in a primary. For that alone the people should rebel; Democrats are clearly demonstrating that they are the ‘sheeple’ of the country. BAAAH.

Samuel Ross
Samuel Ross
13 days ago

What charm? I haven’t seen it yet.

Hans Daoghn
Hans Daoghn
13 days ago

I don’t find Harris charming at all. She is tiresome. And like Biden, incompetent.

Nancy Kmaxim
Nancy Kmaxim
13 days ago

What planet would one have to live on to consider Kamala Harris charming? Planet vacuous possibly?

Rob N
Rob N
12 days ago

“his disastrous handling of the worst American health emergency in a century”.

Any voter who hated Trump’s handling of Covid is going to hate Harris’s a lot more.

Chipoko
Chipoko
12 days ago

The opening paragraph was so nakedly biased against Trump that I failed to read further. This propaganda journalism is becoming more frequent in Unherd. Much more of this crap and my subscription will be placed in jeopardy.

Chris Flanagan
Chris Flanagan
12 days ago

I recognize everyone is entitled to their opinion but I subscribed to UnHerd because I thought this was an intelligent, sane publication. The glowing characterizations of Kamala Harris as charismatic and inspiring are too fanciful to be taken seriously along with the entire line of argument of this “article” (advertisement). I had subscribed to UnHerd hoping to encounter greater depth than MSNBC.

UnHerd Reader
UnHerd Reader
10 days ago

Swing voters haven’t fallen for Trump. They have seen through Kamala.