Three Things to Watch for at the DNC

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Before the DNC kicks off on Monday, let’s quickly recap the sheer eventfulness of the past few weeks for the Democratic Party. Less than one month ago, President Joe Biden announced that he was exiting the presidential race. Almost at once, Vice President Kamala Harris became the heir apparent to the party nomination. Just over two weeks later, she became the official nominee; the next day, she named Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate.

This timeline means that the typical flow of a first-time nominee’s presidential campaign has been scrambled. But after a summer full of surprises and switch-ups, Harris will take the expected step of a Democratic nominee: appearing at the Democratic National Convention. The convention, which has had varying degrees of significance in recent presidential races, could be of particular consequence this time around. Here are three key things to keep in mind as you follow the news next week.

This convention will be light on procedurals, and will focus on refining the political message of a relatively new campaign.

Major-party conventions usually serve some bureaucratic purposes: Delegates vote to confirm the party’s nominee, and candidates sometimes announce their running mate (as Donald Trump did during his party’s convention last month). All of this has already happened for the Democrats—Harris was nominated in a virtual roll call, an unusual process for the party, in early August, and she picked Walz soon after.

Those following along at home aren’t paying much attention to the procedures, though—they’re watching for the speeches and political narratives. Conventions serve to unite a political party around a coherent story. The party strategizes about which guests, and what message, will both speak to undecided Americans and excite the base. Family members of the candidates will attempt to humanize them and help them appear relatable. The full lineup of speakers has not yet been released, but President Biden is expected to play a role. Rumors and speculation about which celebrities may appear have also been swirling.

Harris will be looking to reintroduce herself to the American public.

Despite her name recognition, many people lack a clear sense of who Harris is and what she stands for. As my colleague Elaina Plott Calabro, who has profiled Harris, wrote last month, “After years of struggling to find her political voice, Harris seems to have finally taken command of her own story.” Harris once seemed ambivalent, even apologetic, about her image as a prosecutor, but now she seems to be starting to own that part of her past, using it as a point of contrast with Trump’s status as a felon.

Harris lacked the testing ground of a contested primary—she is the first nonincumbent to win a major-party nomination without a primary race since 1968—which means she didn’t have the opportunity to sharpen her messaging before the general election. As my colleague Ronald Brownstein wrote recently, her relatively undefined image “gives Harris a chance to benefit more than usual from the Democratic gathering in Chicago … if she can flesh out her story in an engaging way.”

Conventions in recent cycles haven’t led to drastic movement in polls. But as Ronald notes, the convention has been a game changer on at least one occasion in the past: Bill Clinton’s 1992 convention speech helped turn around voters’ perceptions that he was elitist, in part by emphasizing his modest roots; he saw a remarkable 16-point post-DNC jump in the polls. Experts told Ronald that Harris is unlikely to see a poll bump of more than a few points, but, he wrote, “she might be able to reach the upper end of the convention bump still available in this polarized time.” Harris’s campaign is also hoping to reach more viewers than is average for a convention by streaming it on YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram.

The convention could help clarify the role of policy conversations in this election.

Harris’s campaign has been criticized for its lack of substantive policy discussion so far. This afternoon, she presented her most robust proposals yet: In a speech in Raleigh, North Carolina, she laid out plans for combatting the high cost of living for Americans, which included tax cuts for new parents, a federal ban on price gouging, 3 million new housing units during her time in office, and $25,000 in downpayment support for first-time homeowners for the next four years. More details on her platform, economic and beyond, are expected at the convention and in the coming weeks.

Given how far along we are in the race, voters may be more focused on the big picture and the themes of the campaign than on the kinds of details that may come up during a primary. In some ways, Harris’s shortened runway makes things easier for her: As my colleague David Graham wrote in a recent article about the unknowns around Harris and her politics, “If Democrats believe Harris can beat Trump, they may not care about much else, at least for now.”

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