Navigating Democracy: Strategies and Challenges

This week, Matt and Brian take a big-picture view of Republicans for Kamala, including:

* Why the Emerging Democratic Majority thesis of the aughts and early 2010s made people assume that outreach to Republicans would lead to betrayal on policy grounds.

* The academic basis for Harris to view support from influential conservatives as a critical safeguard against Democratic backsliding.

* How a more concerted Trump-accountability effort at the outset of Joe Biden’s presidency might have mooted the whole need for a unified front.

Then, behind the paywall, a more nuts-and-bolts look at how this kind of third-party validation works in practice: Are Harris’s critics really mystified by why Democrats keep citing state-level Republican praise for the Biden administration’s response to Hurricane Helene? Would we be talking about January 6 so much, all of a sudden, were it not for the fact that it drove so many influential Republicans into the anti-Trump camp? If this kind of thing is suspicious, or of dubious value, why is Trump trying so hard to pretend Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Tulsi Gabbard, and Elon Musk reflect significant Democratic defections?

All that, plus the full Politix archive are available to paid subscribers—just upgrade your subscription and pipe full episodes directly to your favorite podcast app via your own private feed.

Further reading:

* How Democracies Die, by Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt

* Brian on creeping Democratic fatalism and the role Republicans for Kamala might—might—be playing in it.

* Matt on how Harris can, should, and does appeal to Trump-curious male voters.