WASHINGTON — With just two weeks left in the 2024 campaign, there currently are no plans for Vice President Kamala Harris to appear on the trail with President Joe Biden before Election Day, according to three Harris campaign officials and three White House officials.
Instead, Biden plans to try to help Harris this week by privately leveraging some of his longtime political relationships, specifically with labor leaders, and holding official White House events that highlight his administration’s record, officials said. His schedule in the final week before the election has not yet been determined, they said.
The strategy was crafted with coordination between Harris and Biden aides, who believe at this time that “the most important role he can play is doing his job as president,” said one of the White House officials who, like others in this piece, was granted anonymity to speak candidly.
“He’s out there doing the job as president, and she’s out there campaigning,” the official said, adding, “It’s clear voters want something new.”
One Harris campaign official described Biden’s role for the remainder of the campaign as “tailored.”
It’s a remarkably diminished position in the 2024 campaign for a president who until just a few months ago was at the top of the Democratic ticket. It comes as Harris is trying to convince voters in the final days before the election that she does not represent a second Biden term and instead is a candidate of change. Harris aides believe that message could be undermined by images of her on the campaign trail with the president.
“Harris has to be establishing herself as a change agent, and it’s hard to do that with a sitting president at her side,” one longtime Democratic strategist said.
Harris has struggled at times to articulate how she would be different than Biden and has tried in recent days to be more definitive.
“Let me be very clear: My presidency will not be a continuation of Joe Biden’s presidency,” Harris said Wednesday in a Fox News interview.
Harris has promised “a new generation of thinking,” telling NBC News in an interview on Friday that “there is no question that I bring my own experiences and my own life experiences.”
Still, the Trump campaign has sought to cast him as the change candidate by tethering Harris to Biden and the drags of incumbency, particularly when it comes to two top issues for voters: the economy and immigration.
“They have no idea what a good economy is,” Trump said during the September debate, tying Harris to Biden’s record. “And remember this: She is Biden.”
Biden’s unpopularity has also kept him more sidelined on the campaign trail, officials said. In a new NBC News poll, just 25% of voters said Biden’s presidency has helped them and their families, with 45% saying his time in office has hurt them. When it comes to Trump’s time in office, on the other hand, 43% of voters said it helped them and their families, versus 31% who said his presidency hurt them.
Biden aides have expressed concerns to the Harris campaign that she doesn’t highlight the president’s accomplishments more, according to a second campaign official and a second White House official, including lower inflation and border crossings and a high stock market. The president’s aides have argued that doing so would help Harris, the officials said.
But the Harris team has settled on running a forward-looking campaign, which necessitates some distance from Biden — including physically on the trail.
One Harris campaign official said the campaign’s internal data has indicated that messaging to voters on the policies of Biden’s time in office, as the president was doing before he dropped out of the race in July, was not resonating. The official said there has been little desire within the campaign to have the vice president appear with Biden at events or rallies.
So while Harris is set to campaign this week with former President Barack Obama in Georgia on Thursday and former first lady Michelle Obama in Michigan on Saturday, Biden is scheduled to hold solo official White House events focused on specific policy issues his administration has sought to address, such as prescription drug costs during a trip to New Hampshire.
The president also plans to reach out behind the scenes this week to labor leaders in battleground states to ensure they have robust get-out-the-vote efforts, according to a White House official.
Biden also could appear over the next two weeks at political events like one he headlined last Tuesday with Philadelphia Democrats at a Sheet Metal Workers hall, perhaps focused on seniors, officials said. He’s expected to continue highlighting how Harris won’t be an extension of his presidency, using himself as an example of how that separation is possible. At the Philadelphia event, Biden said publicly that he expects Harris to “cut her own path.”
The president can also be an asset to Harris, campaign officials said, by keeping the government running smoothly — citing recent hurricane responses in Florida and North Carolina — a resolution to a potentially economically devastating port workers strike and diplomatic efforts to keep the war between Israel and Hamas from spreading across the Middle East.
“The White House is smart about just having him do his job,” the Democratic strategist said.
Biden last appeared with Harris at a campaign event nearly seven weeks ago, on Labor Day in early September. That’s a contrast to former President Obama, who has headlined a series of Harris campaign events, and former President Bill Clinton who has also been on the trail for the vice president. First lady Jill Biden has headlined multiple events for the Harris campaign as well and is set to hit the trail for her again on Wednesday in Nevada.
White House and campaign officials say the president understands the strategy behind his downsized role in the campaign, even if at times he doesn’t like it.
For Biden, who after a brief overseas trip last week plans to remain in the U.S. through the election, his 2024 campaign role has turned out to epitomize one of his longtime political adages: “I’ll campaign for you or against you, whatever helps most.”
