LOS ANGELES.–Making more excuses than a fortune teller, 60-year-old Vice President Kamala Harris’s 48-year-old campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon and 57-year chief strategist David Plouffe made all the excuses under the sun for why Kamala lost the election. Plouffe told CNN’s Erin Burnett Nov. 5 that Kamala would win all the battleground states, showing supreme confidence that she would pull out the big victory. “It’s always worth reminding people: It’s really hard for Democrats to win battleground states,” Plouffe said in podcast Tuesday. Plouffe was 82-year-old President Joe Biden’s strategist in 2020 when he won all the battleground states against 78-year-old President-elect Donald Trump. Saying Kamala lost because of “electoral weakness” in battleground states, Plouffe can’t account why he predicted on CNN that she would win all battleground states on Nov. 5.
Plouffe is full of excuses because he was touted as such genius in 2020 helping Biden beat Trump in what turned out to be a rout in the battleground states, the same states and same demographics that there were in 2020. “Given that we had a challenging political environment, the fact that we got the race to a dead heat was positive, but boy, it was slow moving,” Plouffe said, not saying why he had such an easy time with Biden in 2020 winning all the battleground states. If Plouffe, as Obama past strategist, thought that Biden would be a better candidate than Kamala, why didn’t he tell Obama before he pushed Joe out the race? “Let’s look at Pennsylvania,” Plouffe said, beginning the discussion of some the most critical swing states. “Twenty-five percent of the electorate is liberal, roughly. Thirty-four percent is conservative,” Plouffe kept making excuses.
Plouffe knows that in 2020 there was no splitting hairs on demographics because Biden won all seven swing states that Kamala lost. Plouffe and O’Malley Dillon don’t want to admit that what happened in 2020 would not happen again in 2024. Biden won the 2020 election because of Covid-19 scared the pants of voters watching their friends-and-family hospitalized and die. O’Malley and Plouffe want to shift the blame away from them but they fashioned Kamala’s 2024 campaign that was primarily focused on attacking Trump’s personally. How many times did voters hear how Trump was a threat to U.S. democracy, a dictator, unhinged and unfit for the White House? Where was Kamala’s campaign other the slamming Trump in campaign ads or to his face in the only Sept. 27 ABC News presidential debate. Voters were treated to ABC News exposing their bias against Trump.
Plouffe as chief strategist made the decision for Kamala to avoid the press and focus her attacks on Trump, not presenting a coherent alternative for the next four years. Kamala told voters she would continue the Ukraine War, giving Zelensky more cash-and-weapons, contrasting herself with Trump. Kamala even suggested that Trump is a “Putin puppet,” the same smear used by former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in 2016. All of Kamala’s smears against Trump were old recycled talking points from Hillary or from former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) who liked to rip Trump. Plouffe wants to deny accountability for giving Kamala bad advice to keep recycling old Democrat smears against Trump, meanwhile giving voter nothing new for the future. Plouffe and O’Malley Dillon knew that Kamala was trailing badly in the polls.
O’Malley Dillon and Plouffe did everything possible up to Election Day to lie to donors, deceiving them that the election was close. How did Kamala spend $1.5 billion in 107 days, without running hog wild on superfluous spending on entertainment and first-class flights? Future donors would be horrified at all the abuses encouraged by O’Malley Dillon and Plouffe feeding on donor cash when they knew Kamala’s election was a long shot. “For Democrats to win battleground states, it is a false choice,” Plouffe said. Plouffe has nothing but excuses to save his reputation, when he knew the campaign was seriously in trouble since the Sept. 27 ABC News presidential debate. Why would O’Malley Dillon beg Trump for rematch right after the debate if they were so confident. O’Malley and Plouffe did everything possible to deceive Democrat donors.
Plouffe said that Democrats “need to dominate” the moderate vote in order to win national elections,” showing Plouffe’s deception, knowing that Kamala was the most leftist candidate every run by the Democrat Party. With the new Democrat Party dominated by African Americans and LGBTQ plus issues, why would O’Malley Dillon and Plouffe accept a progressive candidate with more leftist views than Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) or Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), two of the most extreme members of Congress. Plouffe and O’Malley Dillon have no one to blame but themselves for running a failed campaign, rehashing all the worn-out Democrat talking points about Trump. Trump kept plugging away at the same message on the economy, the border and foreign policy, and, guess what, voters listened and voted for him on Nov. 5.
About the Author
John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He’s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.
