You want to talk about “electability,” including the version that translates to “white man”? Sen. Kamala Harris will have that conversation. “There has been a conversation by pundits about ‘electability’ and ‘who can speak to the Midwest,” Harris said in a speech at an NAACP dinner in Detroit. “But when they say that, they usually put the Midwest in a simplistic box and a narrow narrative. And too often their definition of the Midwest leaves people out.” (Yeah, defining “Midwest” as meaning “white people,” and “rural” as meaning “even whiter people,” will tend to leave people out. Go figure.)
“It leaves out people in this room who helped build cities like Detroit. It leaves out working women who are on their feet all day—many of them working without equal pay,” Harris said. ”And the conversation too often suggests certain voters will only vote for certain candidates regardless of whether their ideas will lift up all our families. It’s short sighted. It’s wrong. And voters deserve better. As a party, we can’t let ourselves be dragged into simplistic narratives or yesterday’s politics.”
Yes. Yes yes yes. To do so, Harris argued, “ignores our commonality and complexity.” What that means if you strip it down is that it allows lazy thinking and stereotyping, including so much of what we’re seeing about the supposed electability—or lack thereof—of Democratic candidates.
“Our party is not white or black, Hispanic or Asian, immigrant or indigenous. It is all of us,” Harris said. Which sounds like so much political cliche until you stop to consider that this is not how pundits are talking about the race—again and again, white voters, and especially white men, are elevated. No matter who wins this Democratic primary, that line of thought needs to be defeated.