Kamala ambushes potential spoiler candidate

Vice President Kamala Harris is spending millions on new ads against Green Party candidate Jill Stein in swing state Wisconsin, warning potential supporters that a vote for Stein is a vote for Trump. The advertisement also attempts to smear Stein by asserting that she has links to KKK leader David Duke and Russian president Vladimir Putin. “You can tell a lot about a person by the company they keep,” a voiceover says. “Stein isn’t sorry about swinging the 2016 election to Trump.” The ad was paid for by the Democratic National Committee but approved by the Harris campaign.

Why would Harris be using air-time to attack Stein just two weeks out from the election? There are a couple of theories.

One, Harris is struggling to coalesce the Democratic base because of the Biden-Harris administration’s policy on Israel and wants to kneecap progressive alternatives. Stein has been vocally opposed to the White House’s alleged funding of a “genocide” in Gaza and rejects the idea that voting for her is a vote for Trump: “A vote for Jill Stein is a vote for Jill Stein,” read a message she reposted on X. Stein’s supporters are unlikely to be swayed to Harris by a caustic message putting her in bed with a Klan leader. In fact, some progressives are sharing phone bank conversations to that effect with members of the Harris campaign. “I won’t support Kamala until she shows some movement on this,” said one progressive in response to a pro-Harris text. The phone banker replied, “You can just say that you want Trump to win, it’s less words.” “No embargo, no vote,” the progressive declared. 

Two, Harris expects to lose the election — Trump is ahead in every swing state according to the RealClearPolitics polling average and early vote numbers look very advantageous for Republicans — and is looking for a scapegoat. Hillary Clinton used this tactic in 2016, calling Stein a spoiler candidate even as Stein paid for a recount on (unofficially) Clinton’s behalf. It was an easier-to-swallow narrative for the Democrats than “Hillary should have gone to Wisconsin” — and might provide the same alternative to “Kamala was a bad candidate” and “Kamala should have run on the issues instead of vibes.” Stein is polling at 1 percent in Wisconsin, which is the margin Clinton lost by in 2016. However, it is usually a mistake to assume that any major party candidate would win all of the support from a third-party candidate if that third-party candidate were no longer in the race. 

Harris is probably right to view Stein as a threat to the Democratic coalition; some Republican strategists have tried to capitalize on the base’s distaste for Harris’s stance on Israel by running ads favorable to Stein in states like Wisconsin and Michigan. But is the answer to that to run a character attack on Stein? Either way, it’s not a surprise, as Harris’s closing message to voters in a speech Wednesday was to go all in on the idea that Trump is a “fascist.” 

-Amber Duke

On our radar

TULSI’S TWIST Former Hawaii congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard announced she is switching her party registration to Republican. Gabbard served in Congress and ran for president as a Democrat before leaving the party in 2022, eventually endorsing former president Donald Trump and becoming a member of his transition team. 

OBAMA LOSES HIMSELF Former president Barack Obama rapped several lines of the Eminem song “Lose Yourself” during a rally for Vice President Kamala Harris in Detroit, Michigan. Eminem, who is a Detroit native, also made an appearance at the event. 

CNN REPORTERS DETAINED A group of CNN reporters, including longtime international correspondent Clarissa Ward, was recently captured and detained for forty-eight hours by a local militia while reporting in Darfur. The militia leaders believed the reporters to be spies; the CNN team was eventually released safely. 

Democrat injures reporter in stunt gone awry

Lucas Kunce, the Democratic challenger to Missouri senator Josh Hawley, accidentally injured a reporter during a gun range outing on Tuesday, but luckily killed nothing but his campaign. 

Lucas Kunce was at the range for a campaign photo-op with ex-Republican congressman Adam Kinzinger. The pair was shooting AR-15s at steel targets when a bullet fragment from Kunce’s gun ricocheted off a target and grazed the arm of a TV reporter. Amazingly, Kunce still posted photos from the event, dubbing it a “great day at the range.” Cockburn wonders if the reporter agrees.

“Always have your first aid kit handy. Shrapnel can always fly when you hit a target like today, and you’ve got to be ready to go. We had four first aid kits, so we were able to take care of the situation, and I’m glad Ryan is OK and was able to continue reporting,” Kunce wrote on X about the incident.

The photos posted indicate no one should be surprised that someone nearly got killed. Kunce and Kinzinger were using AR-15s to shoot at steel targets that were located only about ten yards away. They both had scopes on their rifles, which were likely zeroed-in for much farther ranges. Not to mention that he barely had the butt of the gun in his shoulder. Other observers noted there was Tannerite, an explosive, on the table just below where the pair was firing.

Hawley spent the day mocking his opponent for the near-fatal error, writing, “I condemn all acts of violence against reporters and call on Kunce never to shoot another one” and, “I know the Kunce campaign needed a shot in the arm, but this is taking it a little far…”

Kinzinger downplayed the incident, insisting Hawley was a “dork” for seizing on the folly because the “reporter is fine.”

Both Kunce and Kinzinger are veterans. It’s not a good sign for the national defense if this is the best the US military has to offer…

–Cockburn

Kamala defends Biden’s mental acuity

Vice President Kamala Harris insisted during a recent interview with NBC News that her White House would “not [be] a continuation” of the past four years, even though her boss, President Joe Biden, has recently been praising her for being with him every step of the way.

Harris’s involvement with the Biden White House wasn’t the only contrast she drew during the interview with Hallie Jackson. When pressed on whether she was “honest with the American people about what you saw in those moments with President Biden,” she insisted that “of course” she was, even though Biden’s failure at a debate with Trump played a key role in the Democratic Party’s decision to move on from him.

Elsewhere in the interview, Harris dismissed potentially pardoning former president Donald Trump, passed on whether she would appoint Liz Cheney in her administration and said that Americans are now ready for a woman president.

Days after Harris skipped the Al Smith dinner, in what was perceived by critics as a slight to Catholics, the vice president also reiterated that she opposes religious objections to abortion.

While she is closing out her campaign by sitting down with the Call Her Daddy podcast and NBC News, don’t look for Harris to chat with podcasting legend Joe Rogan. Reports indicate that she won’t be sitting down with Rogan during her campaign swing through Texas. 

–Matthew Foldi