Event Recap — Women Who ROKK Campaigns: Election Year 2024

Four weeks ahead of an election that has seen a June surprise, July surprise, a September surprise, and enough time for the always anticipated October surprise, the 2024 election has been anything but typical. For reporters covering the campaigns, few things are predictable, including who is likeliest to win the White House.

“I think that Harris is building a heck of a coalition, and it looks impressive, but she still is tied with Donald Trump,” Tia Mitchell, Washington Correspondent for the Atlanta Journal Constitution said at an event with women journalists hosted by ROKK Solutions.  

Harris has courted disaffected Republican voters in her truncated run for the presidency, appearing recently with former Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney. 

“It’s a smart strategy from the Harris campaign to create this permission structure” to court GOP allies and GOP voters, Melanie Zanona, Senior Congressional Reporter for PunchBowl News said. “And they have been making a concerted effort to sort of court those voters, whereas Donald Trump’s campaign has not done the same. He’s made very little effort to try to reach out to the Nikki Haley camp, those types of voters, to try to reach disaffected Democrats in the same way.”

“I think every bit counts, like it’s one thing to have a [former Georgia Lt. Governor] Jeff Duncan and an Adam Kinzinger. It’s another thing to have Liz Cheney and Dick Cheney. Those are different types of Republicans,” Mitchell said. “I think that there are lots of Republicans – kind of the Never Trump, Never Biden. Never were quite comfortable with Trump, maybe went along for a while. January 6th was the final straw. Those types of Republicans always wanted an alternative, and a lot of them were preparing to support Joe Biden until that disastrous debate appearance, and then they felt like they had no home.”

Mitchell said she was texting with a Republican lawmaker on the night of the Trump-Biden debate, “and literally, the night of the debate, he was like, ‘I have no home. I cannot, in good conscience, vote for Joe Biden, but I do not want to vote for Donald Trump. I have no idea what I’m going to do.’”

Biden’s departure, and the quick ability by Harris to coalesce support for her nomination, gave the wayward legislators a home, if temporary. 

“When Kamala Harris became the nominee, he basically was like, ‘I’m going to hold my nose and vote for her, because I have said all along that I can’t vote for Trump,’” Mitchell said. “A lot of this outreach, the Republicans for Harris, is trying to give people cover to say ‘it’s okay to hold your nose this one time and support a Democrat this one time. I promise you you’re still a good Republican. You can look at yourself in the mirror and say that I’m still who I am. I know who I am, but just this one time, please do it for America and democracy.’ And that’s what their texts say.”

Even with the crossover voters, the polls show a race that remains within the margin of error in the vital swing states. The Harris campaign has been pushing reproductive freedom, which they believe in the wake of the Dobbs decision, could drive women to the polls in overwhelming numbers.

“The gender gap has been something that is not a new phenomenon, but I really do believe that in this upcoming election, it is front and center for a number of reasons,” Jackie Kucinich, Washington Bureau Chief for The Boston Globe, said. “Number one, you mentioned: Kamala Harris is at the top of the ticket. And number two, this is the first presidential election since Roe v Wade was overturned. So we’re going to get a lot more clues, obviously, in the coming weeks. We saw some of that in the midterms. There’s a lot of democratic hope that that’s going to transfer to the presidential election, but we’ll have to see.” 

Women heavily supported Biden before he stepped out of the race, and he enjoyed a 15-point advantage over Trump. Deirdre Walsh, Congressional Correspondent for NPR, says Harris will build on that lead. 

“We are already seeing polling data that that gender gap could be widened,” she said. “The one thing I’m really interested in, is the younger voter cohort, because there’s new data out from a recent Harvard poll that shows the gender gap among the 18- to 25-year-old cohort widening. If that becomes a persistent dynamic in our politics, I feel like that has major ramifications for races.”

Harris is also pressing her advantage in that age gap, doing interviews with both the mainstream press, and with podcasts and new media outlets to reach those voters. 

“Listening to Harris on the Call Her Daddy podcast – that broke through. People are talking about that who don’t care about politics,” Kucinich said.

“She’s doing Howard Stern today,” Mitchell said about Harris’ sit down with the shock jock. “But I didn’t see all the alleged bellyaching from the mainstream media. Do I want her to sit down with newspapers and legacy media? Of course. And is she not doing a whole ton of that? No, she’s not. Because strategically, and this is a trend we’ve seen going back really to Barack Obama, who was the first major party candidate who was like, ‘I don’t need mainstream press. I can go straight to the people.’”

“But it was about going to where the potential voters are. And now we see Kamala Harris doing that,” Mitchell said.

The combined effect of enthusiasm for Harris and reproductive rights on the ballot could drive turnout and be decisive. 

“These are really high turnout events when reproductive rights are on the ballot. We’ve seen that in these special elections and the off-cycle vote,” Bloomberg Anchor and Markets Reporter Kailey Leinz said. “So if it actually drives – has the galvanizing force of sending more and more voters to the polls – it ultimately can make a difference.”

Across the country, ten states have reproductive rights measures on their ballots, an issue that has tracked in the Democrats favor every time it has appeared on the ballot. A point the Harris campaign is pressing even in states where there is no ballot initiative this year. 

“There’s nothing but upside for the Democrats when this issue is on the ballot, when this issue is top of mind, and we know that Republicans have struggled with their message,” Mitchell said. “In Georgia, abortion is not on the ballot, because Georgia doesn’t have such a mechanism. But the Harris-Walz campaign today is doing a roundtable on reproductive rights in response to these recent rulings regarding the state abortion ban. So they’re going to continue to keep it top of mind, because, as we’ve noted, abortion wins when it’s on the ballot, and Democrats think it can do nothing but help them with other things that are also on the ballot.”

While Democrats do feel they are in a stronger position on reproductive rights, the economy – and the uncertainty around it – is a tossup this November. 

“I think the economy is trending in a way that perhaps is more in favor of the incumbent as we’ve seen lower oil prices. That potentially isn’t going to stick around, considering what we’re seeing in the Middle East, but you still have a relatively low unemployment rate. You are seeing in sentiment data, things picking up, and Harris is getting more credit on the economy than Joe Biden was able to. He just could not get what were largely strong economic figures to resonate. She’s having more success in doing so,” Leinz said. 

But data points don’t necessarily translate into voter sentiment, and with polls showing Americans still think the economy is in a perilous place, Democrats are trying a new tack: acknowledging higher prices and rough economics and proposing plans to tackle both. 

“I think that it’s a really hard line for a lot of Democratic candidates to thread, because they are being linked to the Biden Harris administration, which a lot of voters blame for high prices. So a lot of them are just sort of accepting that reality and going on the air,” Walsh said. “Bob Casey in Pennsylvania has an ad with his price gouging proposal. I don’t remember a recent election where it seems like a wonky policy price gouging thing, but it’s like you want voters to think like you have a plan to to make this better, because they can’t escape the fact that people are going to the grocery store and the prices are still high.” 

Democrats also face an uphill battle to bring back disaffected voters of their own, notably with minority men.

“Democrats have some really complicated politics to navigate, and it’s showing where they’re struggling. For example, their outreach, particularly to black men and Latino men. You know, they’re struggling with that to counterbalance some of the outreach from the Trump campaign on issues like the economy and immigration. And in a state like Georgia or Pennsylvania, just a little bit could help Trump,” Mitchell said. “The same with Muslim voters and Arab-Americans, where they’re struggling with their messaging on the Israel Hamas conflict. Now there are very complicated politics there, because you also don’t want to alienate Jewish voters, or Security Hawk voters who want us to stick with an ally. But we also know, you know, like in a state like Michigan, that’s been problematic for the Harris campaign.”

Harris met with Arab and Muslim leaders on a recent trip to swing state Michigan, but “they were largely groups that had endorsed her already. It wasn’t folks who had abandoned Harris that came out and endorsed Jill Stein,” Leinz said. “And in Michigan, when 100,000 people voted uncommitted in the primary, 100,000 votes could be more than the margin it will actually take to win. And if you don’t win Michigan, and you don’t pick up other states, that could be the election right there. I think that’s a vulnerability that maybe isn’t being paid adequate attention to.”

For Republicans who want to press that advantage in states where Harris could be vulnerable, they have an issue of their own: money. Despite pleas from down ballot Republicans, Trump has yet to fundraise or send money to House and Senate races that could tip the chambers in the GOP’s favor. A slight that will not go unnoticed if Republicans fail to capture or keep both chambers of Congress.

“Republicans are going to remember this, because they stood by Trump through so much, and they have not returned the favor,” Zanona said. “I think the RNC has not transferred any money over to the NRCC. Donald Trump has not transferred a dime to the NRCC, versus Kamala Harris, who just recently transferred 10 million to the D-Trip by comparison. So if Republicans do lose, there’s going to be a lot of blame that goes around, but the fundraising is going to be such a huge piece of the equation. They are just getting their butts kicked, frankly, right now.”

Tight margins, tight finances, and a sprint to the end could also add up to a delayed decision on Election Night, prompting Secretaries of States and Election officials to go on a media “roadshow” to educate voters on how long it may take to fully count all the votes and declare a winner. 

“Obviously, they saw what happened in 2020 and they’re trying to make sure that people don’t expect results on Election Night that we have all become accustomed to. They’re calling it radical transparency,” Kucinich said. “I’m curious, whether that understanding will sink in, because it is very ingrained, right? You turn on, you watch election coverage, and you wake up to the president. But in the past, the elections weren’t so close. So, so close. Or, litigated. So every vote counts in these swing states, and that’s one of the things that they’ve been really trying to get out there.”

An early clue on Election Night could be in the three critical states of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin – the blue wall for Democrats. 

“The blue wall will be important. A lot of the most important states are in the eastern time zone, so if some of those states are called, we might have a clearer picture on Election Night, but I don’t think there will necessarily be a clarity before then,” Mitchell said. 

Wall Street is also keeping a watchful eye on the election, Leinz said, noting that the markets “are probably very ill-prepared for how long it will take to figure out who actually is in power.”

“This could potentially, with the amount of litigation that both sides are preparing for, could take a lot longer, not just to figure out who won the presidency, but ultimately how the balance of power in Congress has shifted,” she said. “And I think that could potentially be a very disruptive market event, especially if you have any kind of civil arrest that is ensuing.” 

“Markets usually wake up to events right before they happen, whether it’s the debt ceiling or anything else. And I think by late October, we can start seeing a little bit more volatility,” she said.

During the Republican primaries, former South Carolina Governor and presidential candidate Nikki Haley made a prediction about the 2024 Presidential race, saying “the first party to retire its 80-year old candidate is going to be the one who wins the election.” Six months later, Biden stepped aside and Harris ascended to the top of the ticket. Does the panel think Haley’s prediction will hold true?

“Maybe we’ll know in November,” Kucinich said to laughs from her fellow panelists.

“A lot of people look at the Harris-Walz coalition, and it looks insurmountable,” Mitchell said. “You literally have Liz Cheney and Taylor Swift. And, you know, all these folks in between saying, ‘vote for this lady, or, like, our democracy could fall.’ And a lot of people ask me, ‘How is Donald Trump in this?’ And at the end of the day, he is in this. It is winnable by both candidates. And, I know some people find that hard to believe, but that’s the truth.”