CHICAGO \u2014 When Hillary Clinton became the first woman to clinch a major party\u2019s presidential nomination eight years ago, Democratic convention showrunners made sure there was no subtlety in marking the significance of the history-making moment.<\/p>\n
Images of the nation\u2019s 44 male presidents appeared on the Jumbotron in Philadelphia beneath the image of a plate of glass that shattered to reveal Clinton beaming in live from New York. \u201cWe just put the biggest crack in that glass ceiling yet,\u201d she told attendees at a convention awash in signs and buttons bearing slogans like \u201cI\u2019m with her.\u201d<\/p>\n
Eight years later, there will be little outward embrace of a similar history-making moment as the Democratic National Convention gets underway this week in Chicago, even though Vice President Kamala Harris could also become the first female president in the nation\u2019s history. Clinton is slated to speak on Monday night. But the theme of a \u201cpotential first\u201d is not slated to be central in this week\u2019s programming \u2014 even though some speakers will allude to it \u2014 according to two people familiar with the planning who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss programming that has not yet been announced.<\/p>\n
Harris thus far has stepped gingerly around the subject of gender in her campaign \u2013 largely avoiding making it a focal point even as her supporters, running mate and husband often note that they hope to one day introduce her as \u201cMadam President.\u201d Her lighter touch reflects the lessons Democrats internalized from Clinton\u2019s 2016 loss to Donald Trump, as well as their recalibrations after years of watching the former president use race and gender as a wedge to bolster his own political power. The dynamic is also a reflection of Harris\u2019s own historical disinterest in dwelling on the more obvious attributes of her background and candidacy throughout many campaigns in California.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe\u2019s somebody who at every step of her career has been the first in one way or another \u2013 or in multiple ways \u2014 but that was something that was always said about her by others, and rarely, if ever, mentioned by her,\u201d said Brian Brokaw, who managed Harris\u2019s 2010 campaign for attorney general in California.<\/p>\n
Harris\u2019s strategy draws more historical parallels to the one that Barack Obama adopted when he ran for president in 2008. Though his supporters reveled in the excitement of electing the first Black president, his message was always focused on the future, his plans for the country and the inclusive messaging that he would be a president for all Americans. When reporters would press him on the significance of becoming the first Black president, Obama would sometimes note that he was proudly of the Black community but not limited to it as he ran to be president of the entire United States.<\/p>\n
David Axelrod, Obama\u2019s long-time strategist, said that the team\u2019s theory \u201cwas always that you get all that for free \u2014 people can see; they don\u2019t need a roadmap to figure that one out.\u201d Axelrod added that \u201cthere are people who might be available to you for whom that\u2019s not an incentive, or who may feel excluded if you make that focus.\u201d<\/p>\n
Axelrod argued that the focus on Clinton\u2019s gender in 2016 was limiting: \u201cIt diminished her to turn her into a symbol.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThis we were very conscious of,\u201d Axelrod added of the messaging in Obama\u2019s campaigns: \u201cElections are not about you, they\u2019re about everyone else. What you want is for people to feel like you are connected to their lives and you are going to work for them.\u201d<\/p>\n
In her sprint to Election Day after President Joe Biden withdrew from the race, Harris has introduced herself to Americans as a former prosecutor, district attorney and attorney general of California who knows Trump\u2019s \u201ctype\u201d from her years in the courtroom. As she has run against Trump \u2013 who has a long history of attacking his female rivals with misogynistic tropes \u2013 she has avoided addressing his critiques on her intelligence, his suggestion that world leaders would view her as \u201ca play toy,\u201d or his questioning of her racial identity as a Black and Indian woman.<\/p>\n
Her stump speech rather frames the race as a fight for fundamental freedoms, including restoring abortion rights that were rolled back by the Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade. She draws the most applause at her rallies with a line that encapsulates Democrats\u2019 desire for a new generation of leadership and their hopes of turning the page from Trump: \u201cWe\u2019re not going back.\u201d<\/p>\n
Though Harris is not explicitly making the case in her stump speech that Americans should elect the first female president, her campaign is capitalizing on the excitement around that prospect. The official store of the Harris-Walz campaign sells a $47 T-shirt designed by Cleo Wade with an image of a young Harris beside the words \u201cThe first, but not the last.\u201d Her supporters have raised millions of dollars on fundraising calls that were organized by \u201cBlack women for Harris\u201d or \u201cWhite women for Harris\u201d (as well as calls organized by White and Black men).<\/p>\n
The focus on her credentials and her agenda is consistent with how she ran her past races where she seemed intent on ensuring that questions about her race and gender did not become a distraction. Brokaw remembered walking with Harris to a briefing at the California Department of Justice when she was running for attorney general through a long hallway hung with portraits of all the men who had held the job. She was clearly taking note of that visual, he said, but felt no need to call attention to it aloud.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have no doubt that she was very much aware of the many firsts she\u2019s accomplished along the way, but I don\u2019t think that\u2019s what drives her,\u201d Brokaw said. \u201cIf anything, it\u2019s maybe the doubts that have been sowed by people because she doesn\u2019t fit the mold \u2013 that\u2019s what probably fuels her more than the idea of being the, quote, first.\u201d<\/p>\n
Several of Harris\u2019s former aides recalled with amusement that when asked how it felt to be the first woman of color elected to hold a certain office, Harris would sometimes quip that she wasn\u2019t sure how to answer because she\u2019d always been a woman and a woman of color. She fiercely championed the cause of abortion rights as vice president and has often made a point of talking about how her life experiences and her advocacy on behalf of women \u2013 prosecuting crimes against women and children, for example, or trying to eliminate inequities in Black maternal health \u2013 have shaped her perspectives on policy.<\/p>\n
But she has also been quick to remove gender from the conversation when she thinks it is irrelevant. Debbie Mesloh, a longtime Harris confidante, noted that during her U.S. Senate race in 2016, Harris would recount the many times during her career when she had arrived at events and would be asked to talk about issues important to women.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe\u2019d be like, \u2018Oh good, you want to talk about the economy; you want to talk about climate change?\u2019\u201d Mesloh said. \u201cHer approach was that that was a false choice. It\u2019s all women\u2019s issues.\u201d<\/p>\n
As a woman running for offices such as district attorney or attorney general that had always been held by men, Harris\u2019s campaigns reflected the fact that voters had specific criteria they were looking for because the jobs were so closely tied to public safety, said longtime California Democratic strategist Rose Kapolczynski.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a high standard to meet to prove that you not only share their values on crime and safety issues, but that you are competent to carry those out,\u201d said Kapolczynski, who ran former Sen. Barbara Boxer\u2019s four campaigns in California. \u201cThat\u2019s where I\u2019ve seen Harris focus \u2014 on competence and experience, and that message still works today against a Donald Trump.\u201d<\/p>\n
Aimee Allison, the Oakland-based founder and president of She the People, an organization that aims to elevate the voice and power of women of color, said the Harris campaign has also made a very conscious effort to excite and organize women of color than past cycles. That is in part, she said, because one of the lessons of 2016 was \u201cthat the \u2018women\u2019s vote\u2019 wasn\u2019t the \u2018women\u2019s vote.\u2019\u201d White women favored Trump over Clinton, while Black and Hispanic women overwhelmingly backed Clinton.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re at the moment where it isn\u2019t enough to argue to the American population: \u2018Hey, vote for someone because of their race or gender or any other identity,\u2019\u201d Allison said. \u201cThe issue is, what do you know? Who do you move? What do you stand for? Who are you bringing along?\u201d<\/p>\n
Karen Finney, a Democratic strategist who advised Clinton, noted that the former secretary of state\u2019s candidacies in 2008 and 2016 \u2013 as well as women who ran for the White House after her, such as Democrat Elizabeth Warren and Republican Nikki Haley \u2014 helped voters get more accustomed to the idea of a woman at the top of the ticket.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think you can have a Kamala without a Hillary, because [Clinton] broke a lot of barriers and norms,\u201d Finney said. \u201cPart of what has changed \u2013 or is evolving \u2013 is that women can be themselves [as candidates]. There\u2019s still definitely things women leaders have to prove \u2013 like are they tough enough. But now that we see more women in places of leadership \u2013 in the Senate, in Congress, in Fortune 500 companies \u2013 it\u2019s been normalized across the culture in a lot of ways that are very meaningful.\u201d<\/p>\n
For years, when asked about the groundbreaking nature of her electoral victories, Harris would steer the conversation toward the importance of mentorship. She would quote her mother Shyamala Gopalan, a scientist and breast cancer researcher, who often told her: \u201cYou may be the first. Don\u2019t be the last.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
CHICAGO \u2014 When Hillary Clinton became the first woman to clinch a major party\u2019s presidential nomination eight years ago, Democratic convention showrunners made sure there was no subtlety in marking the significance of the history-making moment. Images of the nation\u2019s 44 male presidents appeared on the Jumbotron in Philadelphia beneath the image of a plate […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":8115,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8114\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}