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OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author’s opinion.
Vice President Kamala Harris has faced criticism from both outside and within her Democratic Party for failing to address several key issues, such as record migration at the US-Mexico border — which was her top priority.
Her apparent lack of authority on Capitol Hill in negotiating accords has also been a concern, given that she was a California senator before becoming vice president in 2020. Such difficulties have fueled discussion about whether President Joe Biden may replace her on his 2024 ticket.
The Los Angeles Times published an in-depth article about Harris and how she continues to fly back to California every chance she gets to “hide out” from “scorn and criticism.”
The profile begins: “In a city full of celebrities and A-listers, Vice President Kamala Harris and Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff’s presence is hard to escape. For Harris, the temptation to abandon Washington, where she faces Republican derision and criticism within her own party, for downtime at home has been tough to satisfy in recent years.”
“While President Biden has a near-weekly habit of returning home to neighboring Delaware, a taxpayer-funded cross-country journey to Los Angeles is more difficult to justify unless it is for official business. Harris’ excursions back to Los Angeles are frequently disguised as an event to celebrate a local small business or a stop to raise awareness about one of her legislative priorities, such as black maternal healthcare or reproductive rights,” the LA Times added.
White House officials are becoming “deeply frustrated” with the usually friendly mainstream media’s focus on President Joe Biden’s tanking approval rating as the 2024 campaign cycle begins in earnest.
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Biden’s numbers have been falling for most of the past year, and, in a growing number of polls, he is behind former President Donald Trump, who is leading the GOP field by a wide margin and appears to be on a glide path to the Republican nomination.
According to The Hill, “someone in the Biden orbit also said part of the frustration is the disproportionate media focus on the polls that show Biden losing while ignoring polls that show him winning.”
Though Trump has predicted the economy’s collapse under Biden’s administration, inflation is falling, stock prices are rising, and the unemployment rate is near “historic lows,” White House officials say. In addition, the Consumer Price Index, which measures a basket of goods, has slipped since the pandemic.
However, per The Hill, economic progress is not getting the coverage needed to sway results in the polls.
A Biden official told The Hill that the lack of coverage is a “deep frustration.”
“One Biden ally said meetings have taken place because of ‘deep frustration’ over polls but that it did not reflect a panic over the president’s prospects,” The Hill reported.
A source from the Biden administration told The Hill that “the meetings are intended to discuss messaging based on his age and his accomplishments. There has been concern among his inner circle that the messaging has not been strong or consistent enough to break through with the public.”
But regardless of how the administration tries to spin the economic news, a majority of Americans, according to most polls, are still feeling the pinch and struggling to make ends meet.
A new survey is likely to provide Republicans with more political ammunition against him and Democrats in general heading into next year’s elections.
“As of November 2023, 62% of consumers relied on their next paycheck to cover their monthly financial outflows, the PYMNTS and LendingClub survey said. These consumers also own nearly 60% of the credit cards in the U.S. Moreover, 80% of paycheck-to-paycheck consumers own at least two credit cards on average,” Fox Business reported.
“The report also said that paycheck-to-paycheck cardholders are more than twice as likely as those not living paycheck-to-paycheck to carry a credit card balance over to the following month. Close to one-third said they reached their credit card limit, an average of $9,200, at least occasionally in the last year,” the outlet reported, citing the data.
According to a recent analysis of household debt by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, American consumers added $48 billion to their credit card debt during the third quarter of 2023, bringing their total debt to $1.08 trillion.
While Biden has been touting his “Bidenomics” plans and insisting that his economic policies have made the lives of Americans better, what they are telling pollsters is that his policies caused them to spend less this Christmas season and, in many cases, had them working more hours or working another job simply to afford the holidays.
