Before yesterday’s debate, I got a text from a friend who summed up Kamala Harris’ dilemma: She needs to be feminine, but not dainty. She needs to be assertive, but not mean. She needs to call out Donald Trump’s lies, but not be nagging. She needs to dress presidential, but not be boring.
Female candidates obviously face challenges that men don’t – voters question their toughness and are often ambivalent about how to talk about identity. But at the debate, Harris showed that these hurdles are not insurmountable.
“I think she was the clear winner. She was more presidential,” Faith, a swing voter from Pennsylvania (who supported Trump in 2016 and Joe Biden in 2020), said after the debate.
I conduct focus groups with voters every week, and I’ve heard one theme come up again and again: They often worry about Harris’ ability to stand up to dictators like Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping.
“Some countries don’t respect women,” Nicole, a swing voter from Arizona, said during a group discussion in July. “And that’s why I’m for women if a woman runs the United States – but not as president. Sorry, ladies.”
Voters have no such concerns about Trump, a physically strong man who insults his enemies in the most hostile way imaginable.
Susan of Florida, who voted for Trump twice, described Trump’s style last month: “He’s just a big bully. The biggest bully on the playground. And if you don’t do it his way, you’re going to pay for it.”
Last night, Trump was in some ways a stand-in for strongmen like Putin and Xi Jinping, and the voters I spoke to immediately after the debate said Harris did well. They appreciated her ability to provoke Trump, to debunk his lies, and to appear calm while doing so. Her decision to point out how easily foreign despots can influence Trump through flattery also served her well.
“I was actually pleasantly surprised by Harris,” said Jennifer, a swing voter from Georgia. “She addressed most of the issues pretty well and gave Donald Trump what other candidates couldn’t. She was a little sarcastic and contradicted him, which I really appreciated.”
Jay, a swing voter from Arizona, said of the debate: “Her goal to get on his nerves and reveal what’s really going on behind the curtain – I think she did that really well.”
Trump’s team did itself no favors with women during the election campaign. Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance’s comments about childless cat ladies, the fact that women with children should get more votes, and the role of “postmenopausal women” are not only disgusting; they also underscore the campaign’s central weaknesses on abortion and women’s rights.
“I have a lot of trouble looking past the ‘cat ladies’ and the fact that if you don’t have children you don’t have much of a stake in America’s future,” said Faith, the voter from Pennsylvania, after the debate. “He’s too conservative for me. He’s too fundamentalist for me.”
It turns out that this kind of blatant misogyny is making people uneasy. And it’s not just women who feel this way.
Chris, a swing voter from Minnesota, said last month that Vance’s “cat lady” comment implied there was only one way to be a family: “a mom and dad, married with two kids.”
“For me, this is my dream and I’m super happy and love it,” he continued, “but it’s not everyone’s dream and I want to be open and respectful about that.”
Jay from Arizona said of Vance: “From everything I’ve seen and heard, he’s just an extension of Trump. He doesn’t bring anything interesting to the table.”
On the debate stage, Trump tried unsuccessfully to provoke Harris with questions about identity. Rather than taking offense when he said she wasn’t black, she repeated her statement that it was just “the same old, tired script.” This reflects Harris’ broader approach to gender and other identity issues.
In 2016, Hillary Clinton’s campaign boasted of her status as the first female candidate in a major election. “I’m with her” was her campaign slogan. Throughout the campaign, she consciously referred to the issue of gender.
In contrast, Harris’ slogan “For the People” puts voters first – not the candidate’s identity. And when pressed on the debate stage, she did not emphasize the importance of race and gender, but said, “We don’t want this approach that constantly tries to divide us.”
Voters seem to appreciate this attitude. After all, they know that Harris will be the first female president. They want to know what she stands for.
Carol, a swing voter from Pennsylvania, put it this way in July: “I don’t have a problem with her being black. I don’t have a problem with her being a woman. But is she the best person for the job?”
The nine-person focus group my team spoke with this morning weighed in on Carol’s question. We asked these voters how they would describe Harris’ performance. The most common response: “presidential.”
