The Chaser Report - Kamala Harris Goes For A Walz | Emma Shortis

Episode Date: August 6, 2024

Dr Emma Shortis of the Australian Institute joins Dom to give him a rundown of exactly who Kamala Harris' pick for VP, Tim Walz, is. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Chaser Report is recorded on Gadigal Land. Striving for mediocrity in a world of excellence, this is the Chaser Report. Hello and welcome to the Chaser Report. Dom here, Charles is still alive. I've got a text for him this morning and he is loving the US political content. So we're doing more just for you, Charles, today. Once again, we welcome back Dr. Emma Shortus, senior researcher in the International and Security Affairs Program at the Australia Institute, Australiainstitute.org.a.u.

Emma, welcome back. Thanks for having for me back. And it's time for that wonderful word, again, the Veep Stakes. The contest to become Kamala Harris's Kamala Harris, the vice presidential nominee for her. By the time this podcast drops, people should actually know who it is. So we can try and speculate and see if we can pick a Veepstakes winner.

I'm sure rumors have been swirling around the place, as they tend to do. We'll also take a look at Donald Trump. He seems to be having a bit of a rough a week than Kamala Harris, with some of the latest polls suggesting that indeed the switcheroo is working quite well. Let's get into that in just a second. Right, Emma, well, there's not that many candidates left in these Veepstakes. I'm going to keep using the word as much as I can. You only get to use it once every few years.

Who is in the race and who do you reckon it's looking likely? Oh, Dom, at the time of recording, I should say, it looks like it's down to two contenders. Governor Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania and Governor Tim Walts of Minnesota. So two kind of reassuringly safe white guys. Rumors, as you say, are swirling. I think it's not quite clear who it's going to be. There are suggestions that because on Tuesday evening,

US time, Harris has got a rally scheduled in Pennsylvania, that it's going to be Shapiro because he's the governor of Pennsylvania. But then, you know, I also saw on Twitter slash X, There was a bit of a couple about there being some black SUVs at Tim Walts's residents in the own Minnesota. So it seems to be down to these two contenders. And I mean, who it is, of course, is going to tell us a lot about Harris and, you know, how she sees the campaign falling out. But I think it will also tell us a lot about the future of the party because it seems to me that Shapiro is the kind of establishment favorite of Democrats, you know,

particularly of Barack Obama. There was a story in the New York Times. week about, you know, how close they are. And then Waltz appears to be the kind of more progressive choice, I suppose. So there's been a lot about the comparison between Shapiro and Waltz's positions on Gaza, for example, and what that will mean for enthusiasm and the young vote. And so it does seem to be that kind of that's the calculation. It's the establishment versus the kind of new generation, I suppose, of Democrats. And I don't know who it's going to No, no, and it'll all be revealed by the time the news drops.

That's interesting. I hadn't realised we were down to two. So that's very exciting. Because last time I checked on this, there were still Andy Bashir, Mark Kelly, Pete Buttigieg as a title outsider. But a lot of people have been tipping Josh Shapiro. And I've seen, bizarrely, I've gotten into this loop of listening to Anthony Scaramucci on the rest is politics U.S. edition. It's a bizarre combination. Scaramucci and Katty K, who's this very straight BBC reporter

who helms their American election coverage over there. So, bizarrely enough, they're together covering the race. And he was speaking up, Karamucci, for what that's worth, possibly not very much, was talking a great deal about Shapiro as being a kind of mentee of Mike Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York and, of course, billionaire who had the most expensive presidential candidacy ever for a couple of days last race, I think it was. But, yeah, apparently he's very much the kind of Wall Street candidate. And if that's the choice, it sounds like the financial floodgates will really open.

And Matt Bevin in his podcast, if you're listening, was reminding us this week. I had forgotten that Harris didn't even make it as far as any of the primaries last time. She just ran out of money. So she will know that you need a lot of cash to win one of these things. Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, you know, to her credit, I suppose, in her campaign's credit, they have raised a boatload of cash since she, you know, really since, Biden withdrew, even in that first kind of 24, 48 hours, they raised 80 million dollars and

appear to be, you know, continuing to be able to do that, especially through small donations, you know, the kind of $25 and under. And that's a really important indication, of course, of enthusiasm and the kind of potential for a grassroots campaign. But of course, those considerations will be part of it, you know, fundraising and the role that the VP can play in that. And absolutely, Shapiro appears to be the establishment candidate in that regard, so could bring in a lot of money. I think the calculation is also that he could bring in Pennsylvania, because Pennsylvania is going to be a critical swing state. Really, Trump has to win Pennsylvania and Georgia in order to win. And so, you know, that will be part of the calculation too. And again, you know, who they pick

if it is Shapiro will be a pretty clear indication of their strategy going forward, you know, that they are, they do consider Pennsylvania critical, for example, and that. they consider going after those kind of Republican potential swing voters as the way forward rather than a kind of mobilisation of the base that would come more, I think, with a candidate like Tim Walts. Yeah. So, I mean, Josh Shapiro has done phenomenally well in terms of Pennsylvania, traditionally a swing state to get really a fairly comprehensive victory in his gubernatorial race.

Why is he so popular there? Do you have any sense of what's going on there? It certainly seems to be young and energetic. But, yeah, it does seem to be. as though he kind of outperforms, in a sense, it'd be a shame to cash in on one of the strongest people they've got and take them off the board. But I guess in national politics, Trump's local, Trump's state-based. Yeah, look, I mean, I think that's absolutely part of their considerations and potentially a reason that Mark Kelly, their senator from Arizona, for example,

is out of contention because that would mean taking him out of the Senate and risking kind of losing that seat. So that all goes into it as well. That's purely my speculation. But Shapiro is super popular in Pennsylvania. You know, he won that election in 2022. He's been a state rep and attorney general before that. And he's, he's super popular, including with Republicans. So he's done what seems like quite a good job of kind of walking that center line in one of those, you know, one of those really important swing states and, you know, has been pretty successful, I think, at governing his position, you know, we mentioned Gaza earlier, his position on Israel is fairly popular amongst those critical kind of swing voters that Harris may or may not

be chasing, you know, we'll have to wait and see. But I think that's why there's so much enthusiasm from the kind of mainstream, you know, New York Times set because he is that he certainly cuts that kind of Obama-like figure who's, you know, potentially popular with those swing voters. It's the kind of Obama-Biden line of the Democratic Party rather than the more progressive wing. So again, that's why I think, you know, it's worth framing it as that kind of, like, battles too strong a word, but that kind of tension within the party. And given that Kamala Harris has perceived as being fairly liberal within the democratic, I suppose, spectrum, and look, whether she is or not, I'm really not sure.

I don't know enough about her policies. And she was only in the Senate for five minutes, really, before becoming vice president and surrendering her own policies. We didn't even hear that much of a campaign from her. I mean, there people have attracted her as being too tough on crime. a kind of law and older candidate of the sort that liberal Democrats don't like, but then also certainly the Trump campaign is trying to paint her as

extremely liberal, which makes you think Shapiro might be a good option in terms of being mainstream. Let's talk a little bit more about Gaza, though, because this is something that really is going to be quite interesting. I gather one of the fears that the Democrats have, Emma, is of a strong pro-Palestinian

protest movement. All these memories of the last time the DNC was in Chicago and the police under Mayor Daly went out and kicked heads fairly, fairly heavily. They don't want a huge protest happening at the DNC. And we saw a lot of protest votes against Biden in the primaries, actually. The main opposition seemed to come from pro-Palestinian activists. Is that a risk then that people on the far left won't like Shapiro? Or is that they're neutralised, I guess, by mainstream Republicans and the many pro-Israel voters

being more favourable to Shapiro. A bit of a complicated equation, isn't it? It is a super complicated equation. And look, I think, Domney, answer is that nobody's really sure. What I do think gets lost in the kind of reflections, I suppose, on Biden and, you know, the talk of his kind of betrayal of that promise to be a generational bridge is that that wasn't just a kind of shallow question of age. Like a lot of Biden's problems really started in that Michigan, I mean, they had a longer

history, but his immediate problems started in that Michigan primary where 100,000 Democratic voters said they'd prefer to be uncommitted than to vote for Biden because of his policies on Gaza, right? And so I think it is a pretty significant risk in terms of picking somebody like Shapiro because those voters who have kind of been re-energized and are thinking that Harris, they have more of a chance, I suppose, of at least influencing Harris in this area. and she's shown some indications that she's willing to be influenced, I suppose. You know, she's made some fairly strong on the scale of support for Israel and the United States, some fairly strong comments about Netanyahu in particular and the humanitarian crisis

and that the way Israel conducts this war matters, comments that are considered quite strong in the context of the US. And so there's this sense that Peking Shapiro risks undermining all of that. It risks reviving this as a really, you know, I guess messy issue. for the Democrats that could potentially lead to more protests, especially at the convention, and they don't want that. They want to project this image of unity. They're really afraid of, I guess, what even perceptions of disunity will do to the campaign. And so I do think it genuinely is a big risk in that sense. And, you know, and progressives are telling them that. Like there's been, there's a letter signed by, I think, like 50 progressive organizations. I may have got that

number wrong, but a significant number sent to Harris, you know, basically arguing that picking Shapiro is a mistake and that it will undo all of the unity that's emerged in the last couple of weeks. But, you know, it's also entirely possible that, you know, the Harris campaign will make the calculation that, especially given kind of the movement in the economy over the last couple of days, that, you know, Gaza's not going to be the focus, that it will fall away in terms of what voters are thinking about and now, you know, make a different risk calculation. So again, you know, I think that will be such an important indication of where the party will head under

Harris and who, which voters they think are going to be critical to winning this election. In a moment, Tim Walts and his schoolteacher, energy and calls of weirdness. Plus, yeah, the economy in the US is really tanked this week and so has ours in lockstep.

The Chaser Report News you can't trust. Okay, so Tim Walts is not someone I'd heard much about before all this began. Governor of Minnesota, and perhaps this is the thing that will determine it. There's all this argument about how much vice presidential candidates actually impact anything at all, possibly a one percentage point, maybe even less. He's from Minnesota, which is really a very, very liberal state, very democratic heartland state.

I mean, I know Donald Trump reckons he can win it, but Donald Trump reckons a lot of things. So I guess one of the things in his favor is that he's quite a good prosecutor of the Harris line. And he's the one who's been bringing the sort of weird, their weird meme through, which has really cut through. Former school teacher, he just seems very affable, whereas, and possibly more of a second fiddle than Shapiro, in a sense. So, yeah, I wonder what your read is on him. And I guess it may even come back, come down to who Kamala Harris likes more and feels better about working with. But I must say, from what you said about Shapiro, it does seem as though getting this one wrong could potentially undermine her momentum. Who knows?

Yeah, again, it's super hard. to predict Dom. And as you said, you know, VP candidates are kind of can be pretty unimportant and unremarkable, of course, you know, until they're not. And there's a pretty significant chance. It's worth mentioning that a vice president will go on to become president. Like the stakes are pretty high in that regard. I think Waltz is such an interesting candidate because, you know, you're right that him just being affable and a nice guy and someone who's easy to work with is super important because, of course, Harris is going to have to work with this person all the time. And he has been described in so much of what I read about him

describes him as being straight out of central casting. Like he's the kind of dad or the teacher that everybody wants to have. He's kind of just seems like just a kind of normal guy. Like, you know, there are the descriptions of him. You know, he often wears like a baseball cap and a t-shirt and a lot of the descriptions kind of say and he looks normal in them. Like he doesn't look like he's dressing up to look like a normal guy. Like he just actually looks like a normal guy. And he is a really effective campaigner as well. Like you mentioned,

that he's prosecuting this kind of weird line. It appears that he actually kind of started that. Like he did a TV interview talking about how, you know, these guys are weird. What they've done to us is weird. Like we can't even go to a Thanksgiving dinner without our uncle being weird about stuff that, you know, they just shouldn't even care about.

And it's been super effective. and has really put Trump Republicans on the back foot. Like, they just do not know how to react to this accusation of being weird. Like, of all the terms Donald Trump throws around about disasters and, and he's so critical. And even in the first about against Biden, he was saying worst president in history couldn't be at all generous. Just going, you guys are weird.

Seems to be devastating. It's bizarre. It is. I mean, it's kind of bizarre. But in a way, like, I think it also really makes sense. because so much of the movement is kind of dominated by this, like, hyper-masculine culture that really thrives on, like, being seen as scary and dangerous and strong. And the idea that particularly women would turn around and be like,

you guys are just so weird, like, why are you even talking about this stuff? I think is really disconcerting because in that kind of hyper-masculine culture, that's like your worst nightmare that a woman will kind of ignore and dismiss you rather than either worship you or be afraid of you. And so I think it's kind of, yeah, in a way, it's sort of not surprising that it's so effective. It's just kind of surprising that it's emerged at this moment. And I think you put that alongside the campaign's apparent inability to respond to Harris. You know, there's been so much about how they were like, how could they have been caught off guard by Harris when everybody knew this was going to happen.

But I think, I don't think it was necessarily that they were caught off guard by Harris. It's just that in their kind of little right wing bubble, it actually didn't even enter the realms of possibility for them. that people would like Harris. Yeah, or that Biden would step down to it. They would like her weirdness. Yeah. How funny. I think so.

So can you just imagine Hillary Clinton sitting in the Clinton bunker somewhere going, all I had to do was say they were weird? That's outrageous. It is kind of outrageous. And the vibe shift is really remarkable. And I think that's, again, sorry, because I've derailed us to go back to Waltz. You know, if Harris does choose Waltz, it's, again, an indication that they are really going to lean into that vibe shift and a campaign that kind of leans into

you know stuff being funny and they're being joy in politics and and humanity which has just been missing from American politics generally for like you know a good decade almost um and so it will be so interesting to see if they do lean into that and go with waltz you know the football coach the kind of joky guy who makes embarrassing videos with his daughter um and actually has a pretty good governing record as well. A sense of humour is a very, very good thing and it's been a little bit absent in American politics. So there you go.

Who will she choose? Well, you'll know by the time this comes through. Vice President Harris has made a decision with four people close to the process saying Tim Walls of Minnesota is her choice. If you were her, Emma, who would you pick? Look, I mean, I think if it wasn't obvious, I'd be picking waltz, you know, I think that that would send such a message about, you know, the Harris County. campaign's vision for the future of America, like so much of the campaign has been about being

kind of anti-Trump or a negative, like rescuing American democracy from the gravest threat that's faced in generations, which is all true. But the enthusiasm that Harris has been able to inject into politics and the way that she's been able to shift things to actually thinking about what the future might hold and how it might be different for people. And I think Waltz would really support that vision and that message. And I think also, you know, has a real potential for that kind of genuine generational shift in politics and policy as well, you know, to go back to what we were talking about earlier in terms of Gaza, you know, with Shapiro, it will be a kind of continuation of American power

functioning as it has. Waltz would indicate that that might change. And that would be quite a radical shift. Make America chill again, seems to be the possibility if they pick him. Okay, so really interesting to see how this goes down. Yeah, I mean, I think it's hard to know because Pennsylvania seems like such an important place in all of this. But waltz may well be able to appeal to those voters. And as Donald Trump has said, VPs don't matter in trying to defend his rapidly imploding choice of J.D. Vance.

The latest polls I've seen have Harris narrowly ahead. So it seems as though the switch is working. final thing, and this comes from my friend Anthony Scaramucci, I must say he's quite engaging to listen to. I was quite scathing about him when he was briefly Communications Director of the White House, but as an analyst with connections within the Republican Party, he's quite interesting. His hypothesis is that Trump might drop out if the polls are down and if he strikes a deal with, essentially with Democrats to get immunity. If he can somehow manage to not go to jail and do some sort of deal somewhere, maybe he doesn't risk.

taking the loss and steps aside. Who knows? Scaramucci thought for Nicky Haley. Now, again, that's Anthony Scaramucci, but it would seem far-fetched for Biden to step aside, given that he's won the presidency that he's been going for all of his life. Scaramucci reckons Trump's obsession he's not going to jail rather than really getting back into the White House or even doing the job.

Is that as bizarre and absurd as Scaramucci's only time in the White House? We'll find out, but he's made the call, and I think it's pretty fascinating. What are you getting from this? I'm not sure how much Trump's enjoying himself anymore, suddenly, Emma? No, he really seems like he's not. The tantrum seems to have escalated, I think. And he and his campaign are making really strange decisions.

You know, he did that interview with a black woman journalist in which he described Harris as kind of not black, like suggested that she'd only turned to being black later in her career, which was, you know, a very Trump-like. thing to say. It was just a weird choice of audience in which to which to say it in front of. Really losing the crowd there big time. Yeah, exactly. And, you know, an indication, again, that, you know, he's been in this kind of safe kind of right-wing media bubble and so makes strange decisions, but is really struggling, I think, with the campaign. And certainly, you know,

the Scaramucci idea that he is entirely self-obsessed and worried about going to jail and and his own kind of win-loss ratio totally checks out. I mean, I don't know about you, Don't. The idea that he would drop out and the humiliation of that. Oh, sorry, drop out on health ground. He'd come out and say, I've got a health thing. I can't, I can't go on. I've got to get better kind of thing.

But yeah, that would be. Yeah, okay. He's not going to go and say, I've got PTSD from the bullet. That he won't say. Look, it's a far-fetched idea, but, you know, scowmish, he thought Biden had drop out. Look, nothing, nothing is impossible. I think the prospective loss would have to be so catastrophically clear that the, you know, the calculation would be that this is less humiliating.

I don't know about the health thing, though. Like he's so, so much of his political and personal identity is wrapped up in his own kind of virility, admitting any kind of physical weakness, you know, again, would be a humiliation. But he's pretty good at leaning into a victim narrative as well, isn't he? you know, I'm sure he'd be able to spin it. Who can say. So, yeah, not impossible. Like, it doesn't seem likely at the moment, but lots of things don't seem likely until

they happen. Yeah, look, I guess that would be another fascinating twist where it happened. And bearing in mind with all that race stuff, of course, J.D. Vance has a South Asian wife and half South Asian children. So I'm hoping maybe Jadie Vance will sit Donald Trump down and explain to him how race actually works and how you can have more than one race combined in one person. It's a really radical idea. But anyway, Emma, always great to get your read on things.

We'll see what happens with the Veepstakes tomorrow. And thanks for your time. Anytime. Thanks, Tom.