Time moves differently in Donald Trump’s presidency, so the effect of seeing Kamala Harris back on television screens was like the shock return of a once prominent but long vanished character from Dynasty or Falcon Crest, or any of the stars from the classic era of US soap operas that outlasted the rise and fall of several presidencies.
The defeated Democratic candidate is in the public eye again to publicise 107 Days, her account of her belated, doomed attempt to resuscitate her party’s hopes in the 2024 presidential race after Joe Biden’s candidacy became untenable.
She was appearing on the The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, a flagship talkshow that CBS has decided to cancel once the season ends in May. The decision to end Colbert’s run generated delight on the Republican right, not least from Trump, who is frequently in the firing line of Colbert’s brand of slick, savagely funny satire. That CBS needed approval from the Trump administration for its sale to Skydance to go through, and that its parent company, Paramount, recently settled a spurious $16 million lawsuit with the president, was lost on nobody.
David Letterman, the original host of the show, from 1993-2015, described the CBS decision as “gutless” and “pure cowardice”.
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Ironically, the Trump lawsuit was framed around a charge that an interview Harris had given to 60 Minutes during last year’s election campaign had been edited to her advantage.
Cancelling Colbert was just the icing on the cake for Trump. And it was also a reflection of the fast-changing broadcast news and talkshow landscape. Letterman had the undivided attention of late-night America but the culture, and options, have changed enormously since then. CBS issued a bland statement thanking Colbert and leaked remarks to the effect that a staff of 100 and a bill of a $100 million for a dwindling audience had become impossible to maintain.
So when Harris and Colbert sat down, a desk between them, both seemed like symbols not so much of a vanished time as a lost future. It will be impossible for Americans to ever see Harris and wonder what the road not taken in 2024 might have looked like.
The stark numbers of the election are worth repeating. Although Harris and the Democrats were trounced on the big blue and red electoral college board, in actual human votes, Trump won 77,303,568 (49.8 per cent) and Harris 75,019,230 (48.3 per cent). Some 2,284,338 votes separated them: a significant number of people but not so much that Harris and her supporters won’t always imagine a different outcome.
As Colbert mentioned, she looked rested. She revealed that she spent much of the past six months in restorative mode – “lots of cooking shows”- and that, no, she had not watched much current affairs. “I’m not into self-mutilation,” she said in a rare moment of sharpness.
That acidic edge was a reminder of what Harris often seemed to lack during those 107 days when she sought to persuade Americans that she was a better alternative to Trump.
She had the extraordinary rise from modest west coast immigrant home, a natural telegenic appeal and, when she permitted herself, came across as warm and authoritative. There was no menace.
But there was too often a blurriness about what she might do. And even in Thursday night’s harmless and friendly theatre in New York, her fatal conservatism remained intact. She brought no gossip or intrigue or fresh revelation, nothing to excite the hopes of the millions of lost Democrats out there.
For six months, Trump has talked and talked and talked, as though the Oval Office is his psychologist’s couch and the people of the United States his listener. It may be bewildering and contradictory and frightening. But it has the world’s attention.
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Harris teased an anecdote featuring Doug, her husband, and a missed birthday of hers in the days before the election but when Colbert teed her up, she broke into laughter and said, “you have to read the book”. A mildly exasperated Colbert mimicked flicking through the pages. It’s the golden rule of these shows followed by any celebrities there to sell a film or a biography: the host says lovely things about you and in turn, you tell a few self-deprecating yarns and everyone is happy. Even now, Harris held back.
Six months in, Trump’s second term has, for now, confounded the doom sayers. The markets continue to thrive despite the tariff upheaval. However, Friday’s August deadline was accompanied by reports of a weakening labour market and a dip in markets. He has, as promised ended border immigration but the Ice deportation campaign continues to horrify many Americans. His vow to end the Russia-Ukraine conflict has not been fulfilled. The situation in Gaza has become even more horrifying that it was under Biden.
Already, the Democrats are nearing the point where potential challengers to the next Republican candidate will have to step into the bright lights. Many have interpreted Harris’s decision not to run for governor of California next year as an intention to put herself forward as a presidential candidate in 2028. To Colbert’s army of night-watchers who flicked off the TV for the night, it will take a lot of convincing by Harris if she is to catapult from her place as the face of calamitous disappointment for Democrat voters to their best future hope.
