In a similar vein, some of the hiccups for Harris’s 2020 campaign were blamed on her sister, Maya, whom many believe wielded too much authority and control on the campaign operation. And while she has no formal role in the current race, her husband, Tony West, was just elevated to a key adviser. All I can say is: Watch this space.
Whatever the family dynamic, it’s a good sign that despite supposed pressure on Team Harris to keep out Obama veterans (due to a potential bad blood with Bidenworld), the candidate has smartly brought on all-stars from Obama’s campaign, such as Plouffe, David Binder (pollster), Mitch Steward (field organizer), and Stephanie Cutter (deputy campaign manager under Obama and Harris’s senior adviser for strategy messaging). This is an A-team.
And it was also a masterstroke to bring in top-shelf talent like Jennifer Palmieri to work with indispensable players such as second gentleman Doug Emhoff. Palmieri had a very busy day on her first day on the job. (Full disclosure: Palmieri served alongside me as a co-host on our Showtime series, The Circus.)
As I hear rumblings of discontent about bringing members of Team Obama to the Harris effort, I’m waiting to see how they’ll adapt. Which 1988 team will they be? Dukakis or Bush?
When the Going Gets Rough
The true test of a leader’s mettle comes not when things are going they’re best, but when they’re going to hell. It has been interesting to watch Team Trump over the last couple of weeks as the ticket’s fortunes have dipped.
For much of the year, the co-captains, Susan Wiles and Chris LaCivita, have earned plaudits for providing adult supervision to the campaign. But since Harris’s ascension, the slings and arrows have been flying. And finger-pointing has been rampant about what a disaster Vance is turning out to be, with rumors that there has been a significant finger-pointer: Kellyanne Conway. (She has denied the accusations.) It’s too early to grade how team Trump is handling the adversity, but LaCivita pointed his own finger, featuring none other than Tony Soprano.
At the end of the day, however, the staff is the candidate’s responsibility. As they say, “The fish rots from the head down.” I’ll never forget in 2000 when the Bush II campaign went into the New Hampshire Republican primary as the prohibitive front runner, only to get crushed by 18 points.
When Bush called an immediate senior staff meeting, I assumed a bunch of us were going to get canned. Imagine my surprise when he said, “I want to be clear. You all did your jobs and you did them well. This is on me. This is my responsibility. I promise to do better in South Carolina.”
We marched on and won with our full team intact, and more loyal than ever to the boss who was loyal to us.
That’s how you do it.
So watch in the coming weeks to see how the staff and the candidates handle adversity. Trump is going through a good dose of it now. But rest assured. Soon Harris is going to descend from the sugar high. And then the stress test will come as the staff reacts to the buzz wearing off and the buzz saw starting to whir.
Will they be a version of No Drama Obama? Or will they go in the, um, tank, like the Dukakis Corps?