Political Strategists Explore Kamala Harris’s Potential VP Pick

Joining me now to discuss Harris's campaign are two guests. Bart Markois is a former presidential campaign advisor and Robin Biro is a Democratic strategist and former Obama regional campaign director. Thank you both so much for joining us. Good to see you both. Bart, I want to start with you. Now that Kamala Harris has secured enough votes to win the Democratic presidential nomination, all eyes are on whom she'll pick as her running mate. Now the mayor of Philadelphia has released a video that says Harris has chosen Josh Shapiro as her VP pick. If that's true, what do you make of this choice? Oh, I'm just shocked that there was such an accident, that there was an accidental release of a video that wasn't supposed to be released until Monday. It's clearly a trial balloon. They're looking to see what kind of reaction it will get. Josh Shapiro is a great pick for Pennsylvania. He raised over $70 million in his last campaign just a couple of years ago. He's bright, he's capable, he's popular in Pennsylvania. However, they need to win Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, and he will not be a popular pick in Michigan with the Arab American and Muslim American communities. He is Jewish, and he is a strong Zionist, as I am. I like that about him. That's an area where he and I agree, but that's going to be a difficult sell to the more hard left, more pro-Hamas, pro-Palestinian, pro-two-state solution people in the Democrat Party, and I think it's going to cause a schism. I won't be surprised if they end up backing away from him by Monday. And Robin, what are your thoughts on a Harris Shapiro ticket? I think my co-panelist is right here. Some of my friends who are more hard left will have an issue with that. The more pro-Palestine people, I think, will take a significant issue with this. I think he's a great pick. He's got 61% favorability rating right now in Pennsylvania, and look, we just can't win. We can't get to 270 electoral votes without Pennsylvania. That's just the fact. Personally, I would like to see Mark Kelly, a senator from Arizona, because Arizona is a border state, and he's talking tough on border, and look, border security is even a top three issue with Democrats right now. So I would like to get ahead of that so that we don't have the false narrative that Kamala Harris is the borders are and has allowed an open border all of this three and a half years plus. I'm really hoping that it's Mark Kelly. We would be a better party for it. And Robin, to Bart's point, many are saying the Israel-Hamas war is the most divisive issue within the Democratic Party. If it is Shapiro, how will the Harry Shapiro ticket overcome that? That's the million-dollar question. I wish I had an answer for you. I really don't know how they navigate that, which is why I just don't think it's going to be him. I think that my panelist here is right, my colleague is right, that they're floating this to see how this lands, and I'll be curious to see. I've got some friends really following closely the issues in Gaza and with Palestine and Hamas, and I just don't think this is going to help with the youth vote in the Democratic Party. This is a major issue. I was at that Kamala Harris rally here in Atlanta, and I'll just be honest with you, when we left, there were protesters protesting outside about the Biden-Harris response to the war in Gaza right now. And Bart, as Robin mentioned, also on the shortlist is Arizona Senator Mark Kelly, who's a former astronaut and U.S. Navy captain. What would he bring to the Harris ticket? I think Robin's right. By the way, hi, Robin. Good to see you again. I think Robin's right that Kelly is probably the best pick, the pick that would help Kamala Harris the most. I hope she doesn't pick him because I'm a Republican and I don't want her to win, but Mark Kelly is the one that will help her to win. The Republicans and conservatives are already bringing out all kinds of dirt on Shapiro. There's an issue of a very strong MeToo problem on a senior member of his cabinet that he didn't react strongly to. He has a far-left approach to transgender issues. And when we just saw the thing with the boxing at the Olympics, that's kind of a raw issue in a lot of people's minds. There are lots of things. With Mark Kelly, the only really strong resonating negative that I hear resonating with people right now is that in his company, there's a substantial investment by the Chinese government or by a company very closely tied to the Chinese Communist Party. That might be enough to be deadly to him. But otherwise, he's a strong candidate and he has a kind of a down-home appeal. His position on guns and the position of his wife, Gabby Giffords, on guns will be a very difficult issue for him to overcome in a lot of swing states. But those are the only two issues that really would bring him down. And Robin, whomever Harris picks will be with her at that rally in Philadelphia next Tuesday. What do you make of the choice of this location? The choice of this location tells me that it's to be Governor Shapiro. The fact that he canceled four events over the weekend is strongly alluding to that fact. I've had Republican strategist friends tell me that the scariest ticket that they could imagine for the Republican Party would be Kamala Harris and Mark Kelly tickets. That intrigues me as a Democrat. But other than that, I think he's somebody that could help unite Americans right now. He's a combat vet, astronaut, and he's the hero we need in this moment that we need, someone that can bring us together because we're deeply divided as a country right now. And Bart, we are less than 100 days from the election. How do you see the Trump campaign changing strategies once the VP pick is known? Can the campaign pivot at this point? I think most of the arrows in their quiver, if you will, are still usable against Kamala Harris, just as they were against Joe Biden. You'll see the Trump campaign, just today it was announced that the last factory that makes amoxicillin in America is shutting down. It's in Tennessee and it's closing down. And all of those factories that those pharmaceuticals have been closing down during the Biden-Harris administration. That's going to hurt Harris as much as it would Biden. Trump's going to make a lot of noise about that. He's saying, let's bring manufacturing back to America, as he did during his first term. He has a record that he can run on for that. He'll be talking about the border and he will hang the around Kamala Harris's neck. He'll hang immigration problems, every murder, every assault, every heinous crime committed by somebody who's here in this country illegally, will be pinned to her coattails and drag her down. He will point to the economic stagnation, the highest unemployment numbers in three years, the gas prices, the inflation, the prices at the grocery store. All of those things are things that will hurt her as much as they would have hurt Joe Biden. And I think that's the message you're going to see coming out of the Trump campaign. All of those matters coming out over the next 90 days. And Robin, on the flip side, how do you see the Democratic Party answering a lot of those questions as we do see the economy and immigration being up there on top of mind for voters? Tiffany Bard is right. This will be exposed. The Republican Party will definitely latch onto this as they've been doing very effectively and bringing up exact numbers of increases at the grocery stores and gas pumps. So how we combat that as Democrats? We've got to talk about some of the recent gains that we've had. We've cut down border crossings by 25 percent. We need to get ahead of the talk about fentanyl. We've had record seizures at the border of fentanyl. Border security is doing a fantastic job of that. We've got a record to run on, but it's only a recent one, Tiffany. This is only a recent development since President Biden issued the executive order. That's the only time that we've seen the crisis at the border starting to diminish by 25 percent. So, you know, we are open for scrutiny. Robert McCoy, Robin Biro, thank you both so much for joining us. Thank you.