Moderating:
Remember, do not start debating/arguing about Gaza here. Mentioning is one thing, any debates on it are not allowed in this thread.
Deleted my original comment due to the mod note that was just posted.
Sufficient to say choosing Shapiro is not the best choice for Harris.
Vice President Kamala Harris is expected to meet with her vetting team today for a series of in-depth presentations on each of the finalists to be her running mate, according to a source familiar with the process.
Each briefing is expected to last about 60 to 90 minutes, but some could be shorter or longer depending on what needs to be discussed, how complicated the vetting was, and any follow-up questions Harris may have.
As CNN previously reported, the finalists include Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker.
According to multiple sources, the presentations Saturday may result in reducing the number of candidates whom Harris will invite for final interviews scheduled to take place Sunday. Most, if not all, of those interviews are expected to be in person.
That period of time is completely out of her control and very likely close to zero. She has to address it head on because tensions in the region will continue to be headlines.
There is real threat of all out war between Israel and Iran, not only Iran’s proxies. A ceasefire is either going to happen or to fall apart. Either will be news that the administration she is part of will be involved in.
That will be true if a Jew is her running mate or an avowed anti-Zionist is.
Sounds like a Biden problem to me.
Moderating: Any more detail on this should be off to a new thread please.
They’re all Zionists. Like I said, I think the gettable voters will be gotten. Some of the voters aren’t gettable, and probably can’t be gotten by any of the potential VPs. For any unwilling to support a Jew, that ship probably sailed considering Harris’s husband.
Pennsylvania is the swing state with the greatest number of electoral votes. It is all but a must-have for Harris. She could sweep the Blue Wall states and just eek out an EV victory. She could put together an EV majority through PA and some combination of AZ, GA, and NC. But it is difficult to see a path that does not include PA.
The more I think about it, the more I really hope it’ll be Kelly or Walz, since they seem to be the two who come from the most normal-person background. Pritzker comes from generational wealth, and Beshear from a political dynasty. Shapiro and Buttigieg aren’t quite in that class, but one of them was a doctor’s son, and the other one (like Harris) the child of two academics. I think that matters, because rightly or not there’s a lot of slow-burning resentment against highly educated professionals, and both Trump and Vance are very, very good at tapping into it.
However, I just checked- just about or under 1% of Michigan population are Muslim.
And they do not all feel the same way
Before we get any further, it’s important to get to know Arab American and Muslim voters, starting with the fact that they are not a monolith.
Not to mention- Meanwhile, Arab Americans told Zogby Analytics and the Arab American Institute in an October 2020 poll that they were planning to vote for Biden over Trump, 59 percent to 35 percent. Arab Americans who identified as Muslim in that poll supported Biden by a slightly wider margin, 60 percent to 30 percent
So, we are talking a fraction of 1%. I dont think we need to cater to those who would not vote for a Jew- in fact catering to bigots is what the GOP does, not the Dems.
Mind you, my choice is still Kelly, but Shapiro is a fine choice.
Yes there are plus and minuses. Does Shapiro guarantee Pennsylvania? Certainly debatable. As has been pointed out multiple times, the VP choice has had negligible effect on winning their home state in the past. How much does help in PA? How much does he hurt elsewhere?
No, not negligible. Small, like 1%. But that could win a purple state.
There is catering and then there is just not pretending they don’t exist.
Sure, dont ignore them, but dont cater to them either. Remember, that vote could be like like half of 1%.
Well, agree to disagree. I personally want to win Michigan, and that becomes harder with Shapiro on the ticket. With 200,000 Muslim voters, and Biden only winning by 120,000 votes, that becomes a problem if they decide they can’t pull the lever for the top of the ticket. The ads on Metro Detroit from now until Election Day will hammer Shapiro on being anti-Arab in a way that they wouldn’t with Walz, Buttigieg, Beshear, Kelly or even Pritzker.
It’s not just about him being Jewish. It’s about how he handled the college protests. Even more than that though, it’s what the public perception of how he handled the protests has been and how the Trump campaign will spin that to their advantage. Picking him as the running mate puts the campaign behind the eight ball in a swing state right out of the gate.
They might all be Zionists, but only Shapiro has the negative attention around the pro-Palestinian protests glued to him.
How many of these finalists, besides Shapiro, get mentioned as actually hurting the chances of winning one of the swing states?
They delivered 120,000 votes for Biden in Michigan in 2020. That’s what Biden won Michigan by. Hillary lost by 11,000 in 2016. These are votes that Harris can’t just handwave away, especially if other veep finalists would be better at bringing those Muslim voters back into the fold.
Could be. Could be much much less. Could be that Harris and Shapiro taking a stronger position than has been taken to date pulls the vote better. She isn’t Biden and promises a different approach.
I think Shapiro would be a net negative for Harris. I still lean towards Kelly.
I don’t think the VP candidate, whoever it is, can avoid answering the Gaza questions while campaigning, and there simply isn’t an answer that won’t piss some cohort off. That’s true for Harris as well.
This issue will certainly be a factor, but it will unavoidably be one where the objective is a net positive (more than typical). There is no perfect answer.
On PredictIt, Shapiro has been falling precipitously, but he has a long way to fall. Walz has more than doubled in 24 hours.
Shapiro is at 68 and
Walz is at 24
as I write this. (PredictIt is a market-based prediction app. You buy shares of the possible results.) So people are buying shares of “yes, he will be the VP nominee” for Walz, and they are selling on the corresponding result for Shapiro. No one else is in double digits.