Kamala Harris makes Donald Trump do the one thing he fears most: Get up and get out

The joyful reception that Vice President Kamala Harris received from Democrats when President Joe Biden dropped out of the race and endorsed her was rooted largely in the contrast between the relatively youthful 59-year-old woman and the increasingly frail 81-year-old president. She gives good speeches! She's fun and energetic! And she can campaign aggressively, especially with Biden remaining president, allowing Harris to make campaigning her full-time job. People in focus groups frequently say they haven't seen much of Harris these past four years. Well, that's about to change, since she is well-positioned to give endless interviews, attend frequent events, and give oh-so-many speeches. The contrast with Biden, who struggled to find the energy to campaign on top of running a country, will be notable.

The contrast stands not only with her boss but with her new opponent. It isn't just Biden who has to limit public appearances, lest he get tired and cranky. Donald Trump, at age 78, has also been mostly absent from the traditional campaign rigamarole. He goes to occasional rallies, where his fans swoon over him, but which get relatively little press. There's no incentive to cover his usual incoherent stump speech because he doesn't break any news. He gives interviews to right-wing outlets, which mostly ask him how he got to be so darn perfect while avoiding topics that might draw interest from the larger public. He unloads his far-right venom on Truth Social, but since most journalists ignore that, he might as well be blogging into the void. He golfs a lot and, of course, had to sit in the untelevised trial in May, which resulted in 34 felony convictions. But to average Americans, especially swing voters who will decide the race, Trump is mostly out of sight and out of mind.

This appears very much by design. While they are being graded on a steep curve, Trump's campaign managers are, as reported, more professional and competent than his previous hires. They're no doubt aware that the biggest obstacle to persuading skeptical voters to back Trump is the candidate himself. His overt racism, sociopathic impulsivity, and off-the-charts narcissism turn off everyone who isn't deeply in the MAGA cult. Every time Trump talks, it confirms the Biden campaign's narrative that the former president is a self-centered jerk who will sell out the country for his own interests.

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Trump has so far been able to stay out of the spotlight because of Biden. The president had a lightweight campaign presence. He barely did any interviews or press conferences, which only fueled speculation that the Biden team was hiding their candidate's condition from public view. This enabled Trump to hang back, as well. Trump's campaign created the illusion that he was campaigning more vigorously than Biden, by putting him out there in situations noticed by the press but not by ordinary voters. The rallies looked campaign-like while keeping Trump out of the news. Trump gave a lengthy interview to Time, in which he hinted at election violence and supported abortion bans. These views hurt him with swing voters, but almost no one heard about it, because it was a print interview in a publication few people outside of the Beltway read.

Astute readers will remember that the reason Biden wanted a June debate was to remind voters what a vile person Trump is since so many memories had faded. If Biden had been coherent, the plan would have worked. As Heather "Digby" Parton wrote, Trump "couldn't control himself and behaved once again like the undisciplined, lying, vulgarian who half the country already hates." He told laughable lies, such as denying sex with Stormy Daniels. The post-debate fact-checker spoke as fast as he could to debunk Trump's lies and finally had to quit from exhaustion after three minutes.

But once again, Biden's age worked to cover up Trump's myriad deficiencies. It was too troubling, watching the president stumble, to even pay that much attention to Trump's same old lie-and-hate routine. Not just for journalists, either. Voters who watched the debate were too worried about Biden to pay much mind to Trump.

With Harris as the Democratic nominee, however, Trump is caught in a no-win situation. If he continues to hang back from the campaign trail while she's out there hustling, he'll start inviting the questions about whether he's too old and weak, the exact questions that plagued Biden. But if he starts doing more media and events that are outside the MAGA bubble, he will draw negative attention and remind voters why they hate him. In the face of this paradox, Trump's first impulse was to keep pretending Biden is his opponent. As reality sets in, Trump's freaking out.

One sign that Trump doesn't know what to do: He's casting around for an excuse to back out of the debate that's scheduled for September. In doing so, he exposes how cornered he feels. In his posts, he insists Harris is not "competent," a dog whistle to racist claims she's a "DEI hire." But Trump, despite his massive ego, is intelligent enough to understand that any debate with Harris would expose that he's the one with no merit, who only sails by because of race and gender preferences. Harris, on the other hand, would remind voters how much nicer it is when a politician can speak in complete sentences without going off on weird tangents about electric sharks and "the late, great Hannibal Lecter."

For those who could stomach it, Trump's performance at the Republican National Convention was a reminder that he is not doing well these days. After sitting through it, I rewatched portions of his 2016 speech, and even I was surprised by the contrast. In 2016, Trump sounded every inch the fascist he turned out to be. But the 2016 speech at least made sense and was delivered with an undeniable level of bombast that turned the audience into a rabid, foot-stomping horror show. In 2024, even his lengthy, self-pitying story about nearly being killed by an assassin's bullet was an incomprehensible snooze. At one point, Trump rambled about how ears bleed more than other parts of the body. The theme in 2016 was "American carnage." In 2024, the theme was "racist grandpa is up way past his bedtime."

Here's where I offer the usual caveats that the race is close, especially in swing states. Due to partisan polarization, Trump could win, because he has a base that hates all Democrats enough to turn out to vote. Harris has much work to do to gin up enthusiasm, though the rush of social media love and record-setting donations after Biden stepped down suggests she's off to a good start. But there's a reason Trump is panicking, and it's not just that his entire campaign was structured around a "Biden is old" message.

Trump was running as something of an un-candidate. Knowing most people like him more the less they see of him, he was staying out of view and on a golf course. That path seems less viable now that he's facing an opponent who can give interviews where she sounds like a normal politician and a stable leader in a time of chaos. Doing more press hurts him, but hiding from cameras will just give Harris space to dominate the narrative more effectively. Trump's entire strategy was based on the assumption of an opponent who didn't have the energy to fight back. Without that, Trump's in serious trouble.