A growing number of Democrats have grown comfortable with the notion of Vice President Kamala Harris serving as the nation’s commander in chief should President Biden not be able to fulfill his duties, leading several political insiders to question the motives behind Biden’s re-election campaign and its long-term implications.
A Suffolk University/USA Today poll released Tuesday cited 86% of Democratic Biden voters who said they are either very or somewhat comfortable with Harris becoming president in place of Biden if the duo is re-elected for another four years and Biden becomes unable to serve the full term.
The likelihood of Harris becoming president, which insiders described to Fox News Digital as a very real possibility, could send a political shock wave through the country and would have an impact on all Americans.
“The DNC’s strategy to ensure the Democrat establishment remains in power is to re-elect Joe Biden, no matter how old or capable he is, and then get him to resign or step aside and install Kamala Harris as president,” said former Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard. “She will be untested and unelected, and ready to act as the Democrat Establishment’s puppet president. She will then have the advantage and power of incumbency to run in 2028.”
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“None of this is possible if Biden doesn’t run. If Kamala were to try to run for president herself, there would be heavy competition and no way she would win. This is why they are uniting around Joe Biden’s re-election – to ensure Kamala Harris is able to assume the throne unchallenged,” she added.
Gabbard, who sought the 2020 Democratic nomination for president, said Harris “is clearly not qualified to serve as commander in chief” and that it would be “disastrous and dangerous” for America if she were to become the nation’s first female president.
“This should be a major issue for voters, but the mainstream media will continue to try to cover for her because they don’t want the American people to know the truth: a President Kamala Harris would be disastrous and dangerous for all Americans and our country,” she said.
Similarly, Doug Schoen, a Democratic pollster who serves as founder and partner of Schoen Cooperman Research, expressed reservations over Harris’ ability to lead the nation while pointing to her low approval ratings.
“Democrats may be happy with Kamala Harris taking over, but the rest of the electorate almost certainly is not,” Schoen said. “Harris has lower approval ratings than Biden, and remains very much an open question to the electorate whether she is ready and indeed able to govern.”
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Like most Republicans, Leo Terrell, a civil rights attorney and Fox News contributor, is concerned over the potential of Harris succeeding Biden and suggested that Democrats “are selling Biden Harris as a package” in 2024.
“They have no choice. Democrats would alienate their most loyal constituency, Black females, if they do not sell Harris as a viable replacement for President Biden. This is the problem Democrats will face because they play identity politics. When you select a candidate based on skin color or ethnicity in lieu of competence, you end up with a Kamala Harris. Moreover, the Democratic donor base has demanded that Harris be presented as a competent replacement.”
“Democrats can rely on the left-wing media to sell this lie. However, the American public is fully aware that Kamala Harris is the most incompetent and unqualified person to hold the position of vice president,” he added. “There is no way in hell the American public believe that Kamala Harris is qualified to replace Joe Biden, or to serve a single second as president of the United States of America.”
Harris was announced as Biden’s 2024 running mate, but a Monmouth University poll released in May revealed her overall approval among all likely voters remains at a low 37%.
“This doesn’t surprise me. Voters, once it has been established that a vice presidential candidate is qualified to take over, don’t usually focus much else on the vice president,” Marc Lotter, a former special assistant to President Trump who serves as the chief communications officer for the America First Policy Institute. “Voters cast their ballots for the top of the ticket. Make no mistake, Harris will certainly be an anchor on the Democrat ticket, given her horrible approval ratings and history of being a very poor candidate. The Democrats are stuck with an unpopular president and an even more unpopular vice president. There is nothing they can do about it.”
Others involved in the political sphere, however, believe Democratic voters are not fixed on the idea of electing Biden so that Harris can take his place later on down the road.
“Democrats are campaigning for Biden with the ultimate hope that Biden will continue to be healthy and last through the four years,” said Hank Sheinkopf, a former Democratic consultant for the Clinton-Gore Campaign. “She is on their mind, but the first thing on their mind is how do they make sure Joe Biden gets re-elected against anyone, whether it’s Trump or any other candidate.”
“‘Can she do the job?’ will be the question that people are going to be asking, and it’s not clear that she can, and they’re going to have to demonstrate that if they want to hold on to that electorate,” he added. “Democrats like her, Republicans don’t.”
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Sheinkopf said Democrats will have to make Harris “more appealing to the overall electorate” and “prove her foreign policy chops.”
“The reality is that people are very concerned about China, about international relations and about a potential war,” he added. “Americans are not stupid, and they’re going to vote for the person they think can protect the nation at a time of crisis.”
Dismissing the idea that some Democrats are campaigning for Biden in an attempt to have Harris as president in the future, Leslie Marshall, a Democratic strategist and Fox News contributor, said Democrats “don’t put, especially since 2016, a lot of credence in any of these polls.”
“They are definitely campaigning [for Biden]. You know, look, there are realities. We’ve never had a woman president. And although we have had a president of color, Barack Obama, to have a woman who also is a person of color running is different than to have a White guy, which is what most people are accustomed to, those demographics are realities,” Marshall said. “She just doesn’t have as much on her plate to run on as the president obviously, not only because of his long political career, but also because he’s number one, and she’s number two.”
Corinne Clark, a Republican strategist and the co-founder of FreePressFail.com, said she is “especially pleased with the Democrats hitching their wagon to Biden or Harris in 2024 because I don’t see a path forward for either of them.”
“If I’m Team Biden and I’m looking at these numbers, my first thought is, ‘YIKES!,’” Clark said as she referenced the Tuesday polling numbers. “Firstly, this will most likely contribute to what is rumored to be an already tense relationship between the Bidens and VP Harris. Secondly, it means Biden is incredibly unpopular. Kamala Harris has never been a big hit with the base of the Democratic Party. She dropped out of the 2020 Democratic primary with less than 1% of the vote! But now, Biden is in such terrible shape that more than half of voters prefer someone as unpopular as Harris over him.”
Clark said she believes the polling doesn’t suggest there’s “any particular enthusiasm for Kamala Harris or ‘hope’ that she would take over,” but it instead serves as a “reflection of the Democrats’ total exhaustion with Biden’s obvious mental incompetency, frequent policy failures, and countless embarrassing blunders.”
The Suffolk University/USA Today polling results indicated strong support among Democrats for Harris, despite her dismal approval ratings overall. A May Fox News poll found that 73% of Democrats approve of Harris’ job performance, while 36% of independents and 15% of Republicans said the same.
Fox News’ Ashley Papa and Aubrie Spady contributed to this article.
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