Letters to the Editor: The Democratic Party needs to do some soul-searching. Kamala Harris isn’t the answer
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- Former Vice President Kamala Harris is considering a 2028 presidential run, prompting Democrats to question whether she’s the right candidate to reclaim the White House.
- Multiple voices argue that Harris’s past campaigns lacked clear vision and that Democrats need to address fundamental disconnects with voters rather than simply oppose Trump.
- Some suggest Harris would prove more effective as California governor, where she could demonstrate leadership capabilities before another national campaign.
To the editor: When President Trump sat out the 2017 White House correspondents’ dinner, Will Ferrell, as George W. Bush, ambled onstage at an alternative function, paced while smoking a cigarette and finally turned to the audience and asked, “How ya like me now?” to thunderous applause.
If this is former Vice President Kamala Harris’ intended approach as she is said to be “thinking about” a 2028 run for the White House, the public and whoever constitute the party elders of today’s Democratic Party should make clear, publicly and privately, that it won’t work (“Kamala Harris says she ‘might’ run for president in 2028,” April 10). Harris ran inept campaigns for the White House twice, failing each time to articulate a vision of the job and her qualifications for it beyond ambition, good looks and an often-inappropriate smile. Today, she is further burdened — and, frankly, disqualified — by her shameful silence as President Biden’s mental acuity deteriorated.
Democrats cannot win back the White House simply by being “not Trump.” Moreover, focusing on near-term (though important) issues such as gas and grocery prices is merely tactical. While that may win the hill, it won’t be enough to hold the hill. That will take chucking the party’s recent neck-up approach to “messaging” and governing, firing its pollsters and data analysts, and hiring in their place psychologists and sociologists to help in recognizing how woefully out of touch with Americans’ “gut” the party has become at its core.
David Van Iderstine, Los Angeles
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To the editor: If Harris runs for president, she will need to demonstrate leadership, clear thinking, the ability to take charge of the Democratic Party apparatus and a realistic and positive program. She needs to do that right now, and she has the perfect opportunity: Call a summit of all Democratic candidates for California governor and convince nearly all of them to drop out of the race for the good of the party, the nation and the people they wish to represent.
It would be a stunning victory for her, as it would be a terrible defeat for all of us to elect a Republican governor in California right now.
Fred Aronow, Los Angeles
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To the editor: The Democrats turning over the reins to Harris in 2024 is part of the reason Donald Trump won. There was no way Harris could have beaten Trump — she was not the most viable candidate. For those who say she lost because she’s a woman, at least Hillary Clinton won the popular vote in 2016. Harris won neither the electoral nor the popular vote.
I would hope that for the 2028 election, the Democrats nominate a more viable candidate who could beat, for example, Secretary of State Marco Rubio or Vice President JD Vance. I would like to see Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly nominated. He was a Navy aviator and NASA astronaut and is a moderate Democrat with no baggage. He could bring in moderate Republican voters who would never vote for a liberal.
Neil Snow, Manhattan Beach
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To the editor: I so wish Harris had run for governor instead of mulling over another presidential run. She would be a clear front-runner and a stellar governor.
Carolyn Sherry, Santa Maria
