Here's what voters really think about Kamala Harris

Hold your horses on the Harris landslide takes: independents think she is "liberal" and "incompetent"

Looking at some of the hysteria in response to Harris’ first fortnight as a candidate, you would think she has the election sewn up. From brat summer memes to her impressive donor numbers, it feels like everything’s coming up Kamala.

In conjunction with Breaking Points, the podcast hosted by Saagar Enteji and Krystal Ball, we did some polling to dig deeper into voter attitudes to the Democratic nominee. We asked a representative sample of 1,000 likely voters to give their view of Harris in a word. Here’s what they said.

First, amongst Democrats. The top words are “strong”, “smart”, “honest” and “intelligent”.

For context, the top word for Joe Biden amongst this group - when we polled it in March - was “old”. There is little doubt that Harris has had an exceptional start with her base, as we see in other opinion polls. There is a special merit in having “strong” as the top word: Democrats want a fighter, and someone to take on Donald Trump. She has transformed the Democrats’ ability to engage their base.

A WSJ poll this week also showed similar. In July only 37% of Biden voters were enthusiastic about voting for him. That same number for Harris is now 81%.

That number still, notably lags behind the 85% enthusiasm score for Trump voters.

So what do Republican voters think of the Vice President?

Surprise surprise, they aren’t positive. “Liberal”, “incompetent”, “fake” and “terrible” jump out. Harris is not going to be winning many Republicans over (Joe Biden did manage to do this to some extent in 2020). It looks like Trump will be able to galvanize his turnout not just through him being the candidate, but by talking up the threat of Harris too.

The big question, though, is about the voters in the middle.

And Independents view Harris in much the same way as Republicans do.

Independents feel Kamala Harris is “incompetent” and “liberal”. The latter descriptor is not a positive: in interviews I have been conducting this week, these independent voters feel Harris is more liberal than Biden, and swings closer to the radical on issues such as gender identity and government spending.

It is not all bad for Harris in the wordcloud: “nice” and “awesome” do jump out. “Refreshing” is interesting: as I wrote last week, Harris could harness positivity just by being someone young and new. “Alright” is notable too: Independents might not think she is the second coming, but she might be palatable enough to back her to keep Trump out. But “horrible”, “terrible”, and “unqualified” are present too. There seems to be a feeling that Kamala is not up for the job, which will be a key hesitation for Republicans to harness.

You can win without independents: Obama did so in 2012. If Harris blows the roof off with stratospheric voter turnout - especially amongst black voters - then she could repeat the trick.

But that is a big if. The surge in Democratic enthusiasm is big, but it is more a return to normal proceedings than a unique high. The outpouring of excitement is real, but it is more visible because Democrats have been relieved of the burdensome yoke around their necks that was Joe Biden.

The path to the White House tends to go via the voters in the middle. On the basis of this polling, some of Trump’s attack lines are cutting through to those voters. Kamala Harris has work to do to turn their views around. Her running mate pick, expected this week, could be an opportunity to do just that.