Harris faces historic challenge in running as a sitting VP: From the Politics Desk

Welcome to the online version of From the Politics Desk, an evening newsletter that brings you the NBC News Politics team’s latest reporting and analysis from the campaign trail, the White House and Capitol Hill.

In today’s edition, national political correspondent Steve Kornacki breaks down the historical challenges Kamala Harris faces running for president as a sitting VP. Plus, we explore why Michelle Obama hasn’t hit the campaign trail for Harris since the summer convention, and Hakeem Jeffries’ vision for the Democrats winning back House control.

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Harris faces historic challenge in running as a sitting VP

By Steve Kornacki

Kamala Harris is the third presidential nominee in the last half-century to run as a sitting vice president. And, as our latest NBC News poll underscores, the unpopularity of the administration in which she serves has created a unique challenge for her.

Joe Biden’s presidential job approval rating stands at 43%, roughly where it’s been for most of his term. That was low enough to make Biden an underdog against Donald Trump this year and to spur Democratic leaders to push him aside in favor of Harris.

Negative attitudes about Biden extend far beyond questions about his age and acuity. Just 25% of voters in our poll said his administration’s policies are helping their families, compared with 45% who said they are being hurt. (By contrast, 44% of voters said Trump’s policies as president had, in hindsight, helped their families.)

The NBC News poll also shows the public’s dissatisfaction with the Biden presidency is shaping views of Harris. More respondents in our poll expressed concern about her maintaining Biden’s policies than about Trump’s re-implementing his own previous policies. 

The headwinds make Harris’s task far different from that of the last two incumbent VPs to run on their own. Al Gore in 2000 and George H.W. Bush in 1988 were tied to presidents with robust job approval ratings: 60% for Bill Clinton and 59% for Ronald Reagan, according to NBC News polling at the time.

Continuity was a central theme of Bush’s ’88 bid. “After two great terms, a switch will be made,” he said in his convention acceptance speech that year. “But when you have to change horses in midstream, doesn’t it make sense to switch to one who’s going the same way?” Reagan himself was an active presence on the campaign trail, and Bush handily defeated Michael Dukakis.

 Gore did face a dilemma with Clinton, whose second term was dominated by revelations of an affair with a White House intern and the impeachment saga it spawned. That damaged Clinton’s personal image badly: An ABC News poll weeks before the 2000 election found that only 33% viewed Clinton favorably. But the economy was roaring, there was broad satisfaction with the condition of the country, and Clinton’s policies were popular. 

Whether Gore would enlist Clinton in a high-profile role on the campaign trail became its own mini-drama that fall. Ultimately, Gore opted for public distance from Clinton himself, hoping voters would associate him with the policies they liked and not the man they viewed warily. It remains a matter of debate whether Gore miscalculated.

Going a little further back in history presents a better parallel for Harris’ plight. In 1968, VP Hubert Humphrey stepped in for Lyndon Johnson when Johnson, saddled with low popularity due to the Vietnam War, opted out of the race. After he secured the nomination of a divided Democratic Party, Humphrey languished far behind Republican Richard Nixon — until the start of October, when he broke sharply with Johnson over the war. Humphrey quickly gained momentum and closed the gap, although he still fell just short on Election Day.

 But there isn’t an issue as central to the current campaign as Vietnam was in ’68. So if Harris and her team do have an instinct to break from Biden in the closing weeks, it’s not as obvious where they’d do it or whether they’d get a meaningful bounce. And based on her handling of the question recently, it’s far from obvious whether Harris even wants to try.

Despite her call to ‘do something’ for Harris, Michelle Obama has yet to hit the campaign trail

By Monica Alba, Carol E. Lee and Kristen Welker

Barack Obama has begun stumping for Kamala Harris. Bill Clinton is holding a series of campaign events for her in battleground states. 

Yet the Democratic superstar many members of the party would like to see helping Harris has been absent from the campaign trail so far.

With just 21 days until the election, Michelle Obama has worked behind the scenes to boost turnout in key swing states, but she has yet to schedule an official appearance for Harris since the Democratic National Convention. Two people familiar with the matter said the former first lady has expressed fresh concerns about security after two attempts to assassinate former President Donald Trump. 

Both Harris and Trump are receiving an unprecedented level of security after Trump faced two apparent attempts on his life this year. Measures like more Secret Service agents and bulletproof glass are now common on the campaign trail.  

“After the two assassination attempts against former President Trump, the staffs of all the former presidents and first ladies recognized the new reality and so does the Secret Service,” a person familiar with the matter said, calling them “a wakeup call to everyone” to redouble their efforts on security “in light of the new reality.” 

Her low profile stands out after her rousing speech in August at the Democratic National Convention, where she implored members of her party not to get complacent about the election and repeatedly urged voters to instead “do something!” 

Michelle Obama is expected to add Harris campaign events to her schedule as Election Day nears, five people familiar with the planning said, though nothing has been finalized. She is expected to play a role in the “closing arguments” for the Democratic campaign, three of those people said.

By the time polls close on Nov. 5, another one of the sources said, “she will have made her voice heard.”

Read more →

Hakeem Jeffries pitches calm over chaos in the battle for the House

By Ali Vitali and Kyle Stewart

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The way Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., sees it, House Democrats haven’t held the majority this Congress — but they’ve governed as if they did.

From avoiding government shutdowns to raising the nation’s debt limit to passing an annual defense authorization bill, “we’ve been required to consistently rise to the occasion,” Jeffries told NBC News in an exclusive interview during a recent campaign stop here. “Democrats have provided the support necessary, almost overwhelmingly in most instances, in order to get things done.”

Now, he wants the gavel to go with the governing.

Jeffries hopes to win back the House majority with twin messages of “people over politics” and a promise to curb the chaos of the House GOP. If he succeeds, it would bookend the historic Nancy Pelosi speakership (she was the first woman elected to the top job) with another milestone for his party: electing the first Black speaker of the House. But to do that, Democrats would have to flip at least four House seats from red to blue while they help on to some of their most vulnerable districts.

Jeffries, along with other top House Democratic leaders, has been racking up miles, crisscrossing the country’s swingiest battleground districts from New York to California.

Polling shows the race for House control remains a toss-up — fitting for a chamber that has operated (barely, at times) on a slim majority for the last two years.

Jeffries has learned from the chaotic nature of this Congress — from a multiday, 17-round vote to elect Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., as speaker to McCarthy’s ouster less than a year later as punishment for working with Democrats to raise the nation’s debt limit. 

“Calm is an intentional decision,” Jeffries said when he was asked how he has led his caucus through the tumult. “One can’t control the nature of the extraordinary events that we are being compelled to address over and over and over again, but you can control how you respond.”

Read more →

ICYMI: Check out our exclusive interview with Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., in which he details House Republicans’ path to protecting — and expanding — their majority.

That’s all from the Politics Desk for now. If you have feedback — likes or dislikes — email us at politicsnewsletter@nbcuni.com

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