Economic, foreign policy vision: VP Kamala Harris must 'hone message for post-industrial states'

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00:00U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris looks set to clinch the Democratic Party nomination

00:07after her first full day on the campaign trail.

00:10She now has enough support from Democratic delegates to be officially named the nominee

00:15to replace Joe Biden, who dropped out of the race on Sunday.

00:18Karis Garland takes a look.

00:22In just one day, support for Kamala Harris snowballed.

00:26After endorsements from Democratic heavyweights, Harris now has the backing of enough delegates

00:31to clinch her party's presidential nomination.

00:35The U.S. Vice President celebrated the news on social media, saying,

00:39I'm proud to have earned the support needed to become our party's nominee, adding,

00:43I fully intend to unite our party and our nation and defeat Donald Trump.

00:51The news came after Harris addressed campaign workers in Delaware, the former prosecutor

00:56offering them a sense of how she plans to take on her Republican opponent.

01:01I took on perpetrators of all kinds, predators who abused women, fraudsters who ripped off

01:10consumers, cheaters who broke the rules for their own gain.

01:16So hear me when I say, I know Donald Trump's type.

01:21There'd been speculation on whether anyone would challenge Harris for the presidential

01:25nomination, but on her first full day of campaigning, no one stepped forward, her major potential

01:31rivals instead rallying around her, including governors Gavin Newsom, Josh Shapiro and Gretchen

01:37Whitmer.

01:39And Harris isn't just earning endorsements, but also money.

01:43With large and small donations, her campaign raised a staggering $81 million in 24 hours,

01:49a record breaking sum, another sign of the reinvigoration of a Democratic presidential

01:55campaign that until now was in crisis.

01:59Meanwhile, Republican vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance used his first solo campaign rallies

02:04Monday to slam Kamala Harris.

02:07Here's more of what he had to say.

02:08Now, history will remember Joe Biden as not just a quitter, which he is, but one of the

02:14worst presidents of the United States of America.

02:17But my friends, Kamala Harris is a million times worse and everybody knows it.

02:23She signed up for every single one of Joe Biden's failures and she lied about his mental

02:30capacity to serve as president.

02:32I think we ought to kick them all out come November and replace them with some people

02:36who care about this country.

02:38We're going to talk more about this now with Sean Safford, a professor at the prestigious

02:44Sciences Po University here in Paris, who joins me on set.

02:47Hi, Sean.

02:48Thanks for coming in.

02:49Thanks for having me.

02:50Kamala Harris broke a donation record, bringing in $81 million in a day, more than $100 million

02:56in about 30 hours.

02:57I mean, what does that say about that record and the excitement surrounding her campaign?

03:00I mean, it's unprecedented.

03:02There was clearly a lot of pent up demand, I think in part, you know, a lot of the funding

03:07had dried up for Joe Biden over the last month and people really wanted to get behind somebody.

03:14And it's clear that it's going to be Kamala Harris.

03:17That amount of money is really remarkable.

03:19Joe Biden goes into or Joe Biden went into, you know, this last month with about $92 million

03:26in his war chest.

03:27So they almost doubled it in 24 hours.

03:29Yeah.

03:30It's really incredible.

03:31I mean, it does seem like this is steaming right ahead.

03:33Is there anything that could stop her now at this point?

03:36Well, it's interesting to say that, you know, she hasn't said she had a little bit of a

03:41speech last night where she introduced herself really to the to the campaign, which of course

03:45knew her.

03:46But this was the first time she had said anything.

03:48She's she's given one speech.

03:50She has been on that trail for one day and she really hasn't said anything.

03:54Could Kamala Harris stumble in the next week or two?

03:57Of course she could.

03:58Right.

03:59She is under a huge amount of pressure.

04:00She will be observed with the same fine tooth comb that people have been observing Joe Biden

04:05with for the last month.

04:07There is that little period of time between now and the convention to make a change.

04:10I can't imagine that she's going to mess up her opportunity, but but certainly it's

04:16possible.

04:17And she has had a lot of really key Democratic endorsements.

04:19I mean, former President Bill Clinton, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, but not

04:23yet Barack Obama.

04:25What might be holding him back?

04:27A lot of people, I would say myself included, felt that Kamala Harris would benefit from

04:32some kind of a contest, some kind of a challenge, an obstacle, an obstacle to overcome, somebody

04:41to vanquish.

04:42Right.

04:43So I think she would have come out of the convention even stronger if she had been able

04:48to use this time between now and the end of the convention as a show of strength within

04:54the party.

04:55And I think Barack Obama was hoping to sort of orchestrate that.

04:59But as it became obvious over the last 24 hours, there was no incentive for anybody

05:03serious to get into the race.

05:06And as that sort of fell into place and as the mood of the party became apparent, it's

05:11it's turning into a coronation.

05:13Do you think that that could come back to haunt her down the line?

05:17You know, if she loses, we are all going to look back on all of these events, right?

05:22Joe Biden's decisions, the debate itself, and then everything moving forward about what's

05:28happening.

05:29And of course, I think that would be one thing that we'd look back on with recrimination.

05:33If she succeeds, then it will be seen as exactly the right thing to do.

05:36So one of the key next steps in all of this process is her going to pick someone for vice

05:40president.

05:41Talk us through who the big names in the running are there or what type of person would be

05:45ideal for her at this point.

05:47It seems that there are two.

05:49The options really are coming down to two different kinds of governor and Mark Kelly,

05:54who's a senator from Arizona.

05:56The two options are really to pick somebody from a, quote, unquote, purple state, right?

06:02A swing state.

06:03So that would be Michigan, Pennsylvania, you know, maybe Ohio, but but really Michigan

06:10or Pennsylvania at this point, or else a Democratic governor in an otherwise red state, somebody

06:16who's figured out how to speak to that middle group of voters who this election is going

06:21to come down to.

06:23And so Josh Shapiro from Pennsylvania is a name that is put out there quite a bit.

06:28Pennsylvania is absolutely required if they're going to win.

06:32But he's also, you know, just a very strong candidate.

06:35He balances her out in some ways.

06:37She's not known as an excellent public speaker, and he absolutely is.

06:42Then you have people like the governor of Kentucky, Bashir and Cooper in North Carolina.

06:49These are states that are more or less Republican, but they have figured out how to win in those

06:55states.

06:56And so they want those kinds of people.

06:57And then you have Mark Kelly, who is a former astronaut, the husband of Gabby Giffords,

07:03who was a victim of, you know, political violence and seen as an American hero in Arizona, a

07:10state that they could also flip and that would be necessary to to win.

07:15So this Tuesday, she'll be in the battleground state of Wisconsin for her first campaign

07:18rally.

07:19Wisconsin, of course, is where the Republican National Convention was.

07:22What are her biggest challenges going into there and all the swing states?

07:25And I guess the real question is, is can she win them?

07:29She came out last night with her first, you know, her first statement.

07:34And you know, she had two major things to say.

07:36The first was, I am Kamala Harris.

07:40Here's who I am.

07:41I'm going to contrast myself with with Donald Trump.

07:45And she you know, she had a very strong, very pithy statement.

07:48You know, I prosecuted people, committed crimes, prosecuted universities, you know,

07:54who frauded people for for money, for profit.

07:59And I recognize, you know, the challenge.

08:01And so she really made that very personal, you know, against Donald Trump.

08:04And then she had another part of that speech was which was about her vision for the future

08:08and her her policy vision.

08:11It was a little less clear.

08:13Right.

08:14And so she's really going to have to hone her message really for specifically those

08:18states, those, you know, post-industrial states that Donald Trump has really been yanking

08:25at to get them into the Republican column.

08:28And she needs to craft an economic vision, maybe a foreign policy vision that speaks

08:33to those voters.

08:34All right, Sean.

08:35Thank you so much for that.

08:36Sean Safford coming in to see us here from Sciences Po University.

08:39Thank you.

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