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Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at the Harris for President Campaign Rally on Tuesday July 23, 2024 at West Allis Central High School in West Allis, Wis.
Obamas endorse Kamala Harris for president
Barack and Michelle ObamaendorsedKamala Harris as the Democratic nominee for US president on Friday, joining other high-profile Democratic Party leaders in backing the vice president’s bid for the White House.
“We called to say Michelle and I couldn’t be prouder to endorse you and to do everything we can to get you through this election and into the Oval Office,” the former president told Harris.
The announcement capped a big first week for Harris. Her campaign raised a whopping $231 million in just a few days, and Harris has already started to narrow Donald Trump’s lead in key swing states. Although she is still behind in four of the five states, she has substantiallyclosed the gap left by President Joe Biden.
Trump’s biggest lead is in Arizona, where he stands 5 points above Harris. But when Biden was the nominee, Trump was ahead by 10 points. The former president is now ahead of Harris by only 2 points in Georgia and Pennsylvania; by 1 point in Michigan; and in Wisconsin, the candidates are tied.
As Harris narrows the gap, she is alsobreaking fundraising records and galvanizing youth voters. But it is too soon to tell whether this momentum is sustainable or just a short-term swell of enthusiasm following Biden’s decision to exit the race.
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Interested in who Harris might choose as her vice-presidential running mate? Click here to learn about the contenders.
VP pick United States Senator JD Vance Republican of Ohio and Usha Vance after Former US President Donald J Trumps speech at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin at the Fiserv Forum on Thursday, July 18, 2024. Monday night was Trumps first appearance since a rally in Pennsylvania, where he sustained injuries from an alleged bullet grazing his ear. Trump recounted the story in his speech, and also talked about Biden, immigration, and other topics.
Vance offers AI contradictions
On July 15, Donald Trump announced that he has selected JD Vance as his running mate. Vance, the junior senator from Ohio, rose to prominence after publishing his memoir “Hillbilly Elegy,” but his humble roots took him first to Yale Law School and then to the world of venture capital. He’s hailed as a politician with strong ties to Silicon Valley, and also as a politician fiercely critical of Big Tech. “What do you get when you cross a tech bro with a luddite?” Eurasia Group's Jon Lieber responded when we asked him to summarize Vance’s views.
This apparent contradiction is further highlighted by Vance’s recent statements on artificial intelligence. He has advocated for reduced regulation of the AI sector, and has claimed that tech companies’ focus on existential risks of AI are a lobbying tactic to elicit friendlier regulations.
He also shows a surprising regard for FTC chair Lina Khan’s leadership on antitrust enforcement under Joe Biden, saying that Khan has been “doing a pretty good job” especially in bringing suits against bloated tech companies. Khan notably supports AI regulation.
“I would assume someone who puts the concerns of working people and families first and foremost in his policy orientation would be relatively hostile to specific policies that accelerated the adoption of disruptive technologies,” Lieber notes. “But on the other hand, I would also think this will result in only a limited number of policies that actually attempted to curtail them.”
Lieber suggests that Vance's policy focus might include “restrictions on minors’ access to social media, data privacy rules, and investigations into tech companies for monopolistic practices.” He sees Vance as fundamentally opposed to centralized power, which could have mixed implications for AI innovation.
“This could be either good for AI innovation if you think it will happen in a decentralized way, or bad for AI innovation if you think it can only come from large incumbents with massive resources to spend on energy, compute, etc.,” Lieber said.
Some of Vance’s contradictions may become clearer over time, but they could easily be dwarfed by the whims and policy goals of Trump.
What Kamala Harris means for AI
Joe Biden exited the presidential contest on July 21, acceding to increasingly loud calls from his own party to step aside and pave the way for a new face at the top of the Democratic ticket. Enter Kamala Harris.
Harris, the current vice president, has secured the majority of DNC delegates already and is the presumptive Democratic nominee, but her campaign is merely two days old. We still don’t know what positions she’ll focus on or how she’ll govern if she’s able to triumph in November.
But, lucky for us at GZERO AI, there are clues about how she’ll tackle artificial intelligence.
Harris is a Bay Area native with deep ties to Silicon Valley. She’s also the former top prosecutor in San Francisco and the state of California, home to many of the world’s largest and most powerful tech companies. She’s gone after large tech companies on issues such as data privacy and nonconsensual sexual material, but she has also consistently cashed in on donations from many of Silicon Valley’s top donors.
As VP, Harris was dispatched to England for the AI Safety Summit at Bletchley Park last year. “Just as AI has the potential to do profound good, it also has the potential to cause profound harm,” Harris said in her remarks there. She spoke of not only the “existential risks” the summit focused on, but also algorithmic bias, deepfakes, and wrongful convictions that could be caused by AI.
“Vice President Harris has been a leader on the Biden-Harris administration’s work on AI, representing the United States as the UK’s AI summit in 2023, and has focused on critical safety and civil rights issues,” Adam Conner, vice president of tech policy at CAP Action, told GZERO. “Technology policy issues are not new to Vice President Harris, who has a long history addressing key technology issues from her time as Attorney General and Senator from California, and that expertise would be put to good use if she becomes the next president.”
Harris also sent a warning shot at Bletchley.
“As history has shown, in the absence of regulation and strong government oversight, some technology companies choose to prioritize profit over the wellbeing of their customers, the safety of our communities, and the stability of our democracies,” she said.
While a Donald Trump presidency promises to be hands-off when it comes to regulating AI, look for a Harris presidency to follow in Biden’s footsteps (see more below in the Watching on JD Vance). Biden strengthened export controls on chips, issued an extensive executive order on AI, and ramped up government adoption of the technology — including in the military.
Harris is no stranger to walking the fine line between being pro-innovation and tough-on-tech. She’s done it for decades. As she tries to win back Silicon Valley from the right and make a difference on important tech issues, expect her to draw on her experience from back home.
Russian-American journalist for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) Alsu Kurmasheva, who is in custody after she was accused of violating Russia's law on foreign agents, attends a court hearing in Kazan, Russia May 31, 2024.
Hard Numbers: Russia jails another US journalist, Latinos warm to RFK Jr., Paris tightens security for Olympics, India looks to roll in the deep, HIV prevention milestone for Africa
6.5: A Russian court revealed on Monday that Russian-American journalist Alsu Kurmasheva was sentenced on Friday to 6.5 years in prison for “spreading false information” about the Russian army. Kurmasheva, a dual citizen who works for the US-funded Radio Free Liberty/Radio Europe service in Prague, was arrested while visiting her family in Russia in October. Her husband says the charges relate to a book of profiles of anti-war Russians that Kurmasheva edited. She is the second American journalist that Russia has sentenced to a lengthy prison term in the past four days alone.
24: ¿Latinos por Roberto? A new poll shows 24% of US Hispanic voters support third-party candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. That’s nearly 10 points above the national average. Respondents were split 36 to 36 on Biden vs. Trump. The poll was taken before Biden dropped out of the race, but it illustrates the increasingly uphill battle that Democrats face in keeping the support of a traditionally blue voting group. Read our in-depth look at the “Latino vote” here.
30,000: France is not messing around when it comes to security for the Paris Olympics, which begin later this week. Authorities will deploy 30,000 police throughout the event, rising to 45,000 during peak times. Alongside them will be 15,000 French military personnel and nearly 2,000 foreign police. Security officials have already conducted hundreds of raids, arresting members of far-right, far-left, and jihadist groups suspected of planning attacks. At least two plots have reportedly been broken up already.
4: India wants to get into the deep-sea mining game as it tries to secure supplies of rare minerals critical for its economy and energy transition. New Delhi has already won several licenses for the Indian Ocean, but it’s eyeing a bigger prize: a vast swathe of the Pacific between Mexico and Hawaii. Experts say it will take India at least four years to develop the required skills and technology to compete with Asian rival China. In the meantime, international authorities are still working out rules for deep-sea mining.
56: For the first time ever, a majority of new HIV infections occurred outside of sub-Saharan Africa, a UN report says. The milestone, based on numbers from 2023, reflects sustained progress against the disease by governments in Africa – where new infections have fallen 56% since 2010. Globally, new infections have fallen 39% during that time. But experts warn that case numbers are currently rising elsewhere in the world, particularly in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East and north Africa.
FILE PHOTO: U.S. President Joe Biden claps hands next to U.S. Vice-President Kamala Harris while hosting a Juneteenth concert on the South Lawn at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S. June 10, 2024.
Bye-bye Biden. Will Dems choose Harris?
After resisting calls from within the Democratic Party for him to resign for weeks, President Joe Biden announced Sunday that he will not run for reelection in November. He then endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris to replace him.
What now? By dropping out, the delegates who pledged to vote for Biden can now vote for whomever they want, opening the door for the party to rally behind another candidate ahead of the Democratic National Convention. Alternatively, the party could conduct an open convention where prospective nominees vie for support from delegates at the DNC on Aug. 19.
Bill and Hillary Clinton have already come out in support of Harris, with more party heavyweights expected to endorse her in the coming days. Other potential candidates are unlikely to throw their hats in the ring to avoid creating chaos. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has already announced she is not seeking the nomination, and California Gov. Gavin Newsom endorsed Harris. “I think that they will wait, they’ll bide their time,” says GZERO and Eurasia Group’s Ian Bremmer. “They will support Harris, and they’ll wait themselves until 2028.”
But that doesn’t mean others won’t consider a bid. Late Sunday, there were reports that Sen. Joe Manchin, of West Virginia, may re-register as a Democrat in order to compete for the nomination.
Still, Harris is an obvious successor for more reasons than just being Biden’s VP. Importantly, the Biden-Harris campaign war chest – totaling $95.9 million at the end of June – can easily transfer to her. Campaign finance law would require those funds be transferred to the DNC or a Super PAC if anyone else becomes the nominee, making coordination far more difficult.
That being said, Ian says that Harris would “benefit from a process that doesn’t look like the political machine has just decided that they’re going to anoint her, that there’s not going to be a primary process … there needs to be some level of competition.”
Who is Kamala Harris? Harris is the first woman, first Black person, and first Asian American to ascend to the vice presidency. And she would be the first female US president if elected.
Harris began her political career as a prosecutor, district attorney, and state attorney general in California, and went on to be elected to the US Senate in 2016. Her law enforcement record has been both a gift and a curse to her political campaigns, giving opponents on both sides of the aisle fodder to point to when she was either too tough, or not tough enough, on crime.
As VP, Harris has struggled to define herself while being tasked with an issue portfolio that included voting rights and stemming illegal migration at the southern border.
How does she fare against Donald Trump? “That’s the big wild card in this election,” says Eurasia Group’s US director Jon Lieber. “Her favorability is basically where Joe Biden’s was – in the high 30s – which is a bad place to be if you’re going to get elected, but Donald Trump isn’t that popular himself.”
An Economist/YouGov survey found that 79% of Democrats would support Harris as the party’s nominee, and across recent polls, Harris trails Trump by two percentage points nationally, 46% to 48%.
Having been Biden’s VP, Harris will be attacked by the GOP for the administration’s handling of the border and the economy. “Trump does better on the top issues in this campaign, which are inflation, the economy, and immigration,” says Lieber.
That said, she has reenergized the Democratic Party, many of whose leaders seemed close to accepting defeat with Biden atop the ticket. Harris, at 59, also brings youth to a campaign that was previously between two octogenarians. Despite having a decades-long political career, most Americans don’t really know Harris, which gives her the opportunity to make a new impression in the 107 days left on the campaign trail.
“That’s an eternity in US politics,” says Ian. “It is longer than most elections in democracies” around the world.
FILE PHOTO: U.S. President Joe Biden is welcomed by Israeli Prime Minster Benjamin Netanyahu, as he visits Israel amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Tel Aviv, Israel, October 18, 2023.
Biden’s out, Bibi’s still in
How will Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s upcoming visit to Washington, DC, unfold now that US President Joe Biden has called off his 2024 reelection campaign?
As late as Sunday morning,media outlets were reporting that Biden didn’t want to give Netanyahu “the satisfaction” of bowing out before the trip, due to their recent disagreements over the Israel-Hamas war. Netanyahu was originally scheduled to meet Biden, but that’s in limbo given Biden’s COVID-19 diagnosis.
Now that Biden has announced he will step down, will Vice President Kamala Harris step up? She was already scheduled to meet with the Israeli PM, and all eyes will be on what message she delivers – and how she delivers it, considering it’s her first high-profile foreign policy gig.
Then again, it might not. Netanyahu hopes to have a tete-a-tete with Republican nominee Donald Trump,though no meeting has been confirmed. Republicans have invited the Israeli leader to address a joint session of the US Congress on Wednesday –a speech several Democrats plan to boycott, as 60 of them did during Netanyahu’s lastaddress to Congress in 2015, when he attempted to disrupt the Iran nuclear deal. We’ll be watching who comes out and who stays home this time.FILE PHOTO: U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris campaigns at Westover High School in Fayetteville, North Carolina, U.S., July 18, 2024.
Hard Numbers: The Kamala Harris Edition
38: A FiveThirtyEight analysis of nationwide polls earlier this month found Kamala Harris had a 38% chance of winning the electoral college in November, slightly higher than Joe Biden’s 35%. In either scenario, Trump is still the heavy favorite, but there is a lot of campaigning to do before November.
95.9 million: The $95.9 million war chest the Biden campaign pulled together before his dropping out will now be the center of attention as the unprecedented decision to leave the top of the ticket this late in the game puts the funds in question. Legally speaking, it will be easiest for Kamala Harris to take control of the pot, another measure in her favor.
60: Kamala Harris turns 60 in October, which would make her the average age of presidents should she win. Donald Trump, on the other hand, at 78 years and 8 months, would become the oldest president ever inaugurated.
106: There are exactly 106 days left before the US general election on Nov. 5, and Kamala Harris will need every second to rally the party around her and fight for her shot at the Oval Office. Stay tuned to GZERO for the whole ride.JD Vance
Strongman politics and working-class appeal: GOP’s foreign policy
On the third day of the Republican National Convention, themed “Make America Strong Once Again,” the GOP laid out their vision for the world, outlining what US foreign policy could look like under Donald Trump and JD Vance.
In his keynote address, Vance officially accepted the nomination to be Trump’s VP running mate and used his working-class upbringing to make his key foreign policy points: that globalization has ruined neighborhoods like his, foreign intervention has led to his friends dying overseas, and that the working class is declining because Washington is in the pocket of multinational corporations.
He said the US needs “a leader who is not in the pocket of big business but answers to the working man, union and nonunion alike … a leader who won’t sell out to multinational corporations.” This runs in contrast to an interview Trump gave this week callingfor a more than $700 billion cut to the corporate tax rate.
Vance couldn’t have been received with more enthusiasm. He called out his grandmother, who he referred to as “Mamaw,” and his mother Beverly, who struggled with drug addiction in his early life, as the crowd broke into chants of “JD’s mom” and “Mamaw.”
“To the people of Middletown, Ohio, and all the forgotten communities in Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and every corner of our nation,” Vance said, shouting out key swing states in this year’s election, “I promise you this: I will never forget where I came from.”
Before he took to the stage, the evening’s speakers painted Trump as a strongman necessary during tumultuous times. They also called for increasing US energy production, hammered Joe Biden on his trade policy and handling of the Afghanistan withdrawal, and called for a crackdown on immigration through the Southern border.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott was met with a resounding chant of “Send them back! Send them back! Send them back!” during his speech in praising Trump’s immigration agenda, which he said includes plans to deport migrants who enter the US illegally. He was followed by Trump’s former ICE director, Tom Homan, who told undocumented immigrants “You’d better start packing now. You're damn right. Because you’re going home.”
Doug Burgum gave a hint at what energy policy would look like under Trump 2.o. The North Dakota governor is a likely pick for Trump’s Energy Secretary and linked US energy independence with national security, saying that Biden “is using mandates to shut down reliable baseload electricity. That is why your electric bills have shot upwards.” He ended by taking a knock at Biden’s efforts to incentivize Americans to purchase electric vehicles, saying that Trump will let the crowd keep driving gas-powered cars.
He was followed by the parents of the 13 US soldiers killed in the bombing in Kabul amid the Afghanistan withdrawal in 2021 who, alongside military officials, criticized Biden’s handling of the withdrawal and response in the aftermath.
But could Republican criticisms of the withdrawal from Afghanistan under Biden come back to bite them when it comes to defending Trump’s plans for Ukraine? Vance said at the Munich Security Conference earlier this year that it is unrealistic for the US to continue providing the same level of assistance to Ukraine moving forward, and Trump has signaled that he would reduce aid to Ukraine. But would the former president – who prides himself on being a winner – be willing to lose Ukraine?
Tomorrow, on the RNC’s final day, Trump will address the country for the first time since becoming the official Republican nominee – and less than a week after he was nearly assassinated.