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THE ONE VICE PRESIDENTIAL PICK WHO COULD RUIN DEMOCRATIC UNITY  
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David Klion
July 24, 2024
The New Republic
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_ Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro is a leading candidate to be
Kamala Harris’s running mate. Selecting him would fracture the
party. _

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro (May 2022 campaign photo),

 

When President Joe Biden announced on Sunday that he was no longer
running for reelection
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was endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris to take his place, an
immediate wave of euphoria swept across the broad spectrum of the
Democratic coalition. In an instant, an 81-year-old white man who
frequently struggled to form complete sentences was out and a
59-year-old multiracial woman who communicates in the crisp language
of an experienced prosecutor was in. Harris raked in a record $81
million
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just 24 hours, and Republicans started openly panicking
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Across Blue America, everyone is coconut-pilled
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That includes the left, or, more precisely, the Bernie Sanders wing of
the Democratic Party—progressive millennial voters such as myself
who were grudgingly welcomed into Biden’s big tent four years ago.
On issues like labor, climate, and student debt, Biden delivered far
more for us than anyone anticipated. In the process, he earned the
loyalty of Sanders and his heir apparent, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez,
both of whom were among Biden’s staunchest defenders
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calls for him to step down grew over the last month following
his humiliating performance
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last month’s debate.

For rank-and-file leftists, however, any goodwill Biden might have
banked on domestic policy had long since been squandered. For more
than nine months following Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attacks on
Israel, Biden has fully enabled
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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s reprisal campaign and
his genocidal
[[link removed](24)01169-3/fulltext] war
crimes
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the Palestinians of Gaza. At the same time, he and his allies have
arrogantly dismissed a wave of activism driven by young leftists
demanding an immediate cease-fire. These activists never wanted Trump
to return to power and, for the most part, understood he would be at
least as bad as Biden on Palestine—and worse on everything else.
Still, it was impossible to muster any grassroots enthusiasm for
reelecting “Genocide Joe” amid the daily flood of horrific videos,
images, and reports from Gaza. Biden’s stance on Palestine wasn’t
the biggest reason he was struggling in the polls even before the
debate fiasco. But it undoubtedly hurt him at the margins, and
especially in the must-win state of Michigan, with its sizable Arab
American population.

No one on the left expects Harris to be perfect
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but there are already reasons to think she could be an
improvement. Back in March
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she was out ahead of Biden in both calling for a cease-fire and
sounding the alarm about famine and inhumane conditions in Gaza, which
she explicitly blamed on the Israeli government. This week, as
Netanyahu visits Washington for a joint address to Congress,
she’s skipping the speech
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she would normally be expected to preside over in her role as
president of the Senate) and will instead meet with Netanyahu
one-on-one to demand an end to the war. _The Wall Street
Journal_ reported yesterday
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she would likely replace national security adviser Jake Sullivan and
Secretary of State Antony Blinken, both of whom are deeply implicated
in Biden’s disastrous Middle East strategy. (Harris also has a
personal connection to left-wing activists that Biden lacks: Her
stepdaughter, Ella Emhoff is an active presence
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pro-Palestinian circles.)

This is a hopeful moment for the whole left-liberal coalition. The
vibes, for once, are good. Almost every leftist I know is excited
about Harris and thinks Trump is beatable. With a newly united party
behind her, there are only so many ways Harris can screw it up, but
one seems all too plausible: She could select Pennsylvania Governor
Josh Shapiro as her running mate.

On paper, it’s understandable why Shapiro is among the leading
candidates reportedly
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vetted by Harris. Like nearly all of the veep contenders, he’s a
white male governor with a centrist reputation. At 51, he’s even
younger than Harris and a fresh face, having only held his current job
for 18 months. He has already shown himself to be a more than capable
administrator, generating a lot of good publicity
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repairing a damaged section of Interstate 95 within two weeks. Most
importantly, Pennsylvania is the most valuable swing state in play,
worth 19 electoral votes, and Shapiro is very popular there
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Unfortunately, Shapiro also stands out among the current field of
potential running mates as being egregiously bad on Palestine. It’s
not just that he, like many Democrats, is an outspoken supporter of
Israel—though he certainly is, having championed Israel’s war
against Hamas consistently and without any apparent concern
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Palestinian civilians. Shapiro has, moreover, done far more than most
Democrats to attack pro-Palestine antiwar demonstrators, in ways that
call into question his basic commitment to First Amendment rights.

In his previous role as Pennsylvania attorney general,
Shapiro championed
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state’s constitutionally dubious anti-BDS (boycott, divestment,
sanctions) law against Ben & Jerry’s after the ice cream maker
refused to license its product for sale in Israeli settlements. “BDS
is rooted in antisemitism,” Shapiro wrote in a statement in 2021, as
he condemned a company named for its two Jewish American founders.
“The stated goal of this amorphous movement is the removal of Jewish
citizens from the region and I strongly oppose their efforts.”

As governor, Shapiro’s particular animus against pro-Palestine
activism has only grown more apparent and troubling. Last December, he
played an active role in the GOP-orchestrated sacking of University of
Pennsylvania President Liz Magill. During a visit to Goldie, the
popular Philadelphia restaurant co-owned by the Israeli-born celebrity
chef Michael Solomonov, Shapiro condemned Magill’s testimony on
alleged antisemitism on the Ivy League campus before Representative
Elise Stefanik, the MAGA right’s grand inquisitor. “That was an
unacceptable statement from the president of Penn,” Shapiro said
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referring to Magill’s unwillingness to accept Stefanik’s slippery
framing on what constitutes antisemitism. “Frankly, I thought her
comments were absolutely shameful. It should not be hard to condemn
genocide.” Magill resigned four days after her testimony and three
days after Shapiro’s statement, legitimizing the GOP’s wider
assault on academic freedom, which would be repeated successfully
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Harvard President Claudine Gay weeks later.

In April, Shapiro’s office baselessly claimed
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a peaceful pro-Palestine encampment on the Penn campus threatened
student safety. “If the universities in accordance with their
policies can’t guarantee the safety and security and well-being of
the students, then I think it is incumbent upon a local mayor or local
governor or local town councilor, whoever is the local leadership
there, to step in and enforce the law,” Shapiro told Politico
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the time. In May, he urged Penn
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shut down the encampment completely. “The University of Pennsylvania
has an obligation to their safety,” he said, once again alluding to
nonexistent threats to the physical well-being of Jewish students.
“It is past time for the university to act, to address this, to
disband the encampment, and to restore order and safety on campus.”
The university complied; one day and 33 arrests
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Shapiro’s office said Penn “made the right decision.”

That same week, _The New York Times_ profiled
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as one to watch in his party with the headline “A Rising Democrat
Leans Into the Campus Fight Over Antisemitism.” In that piece,
Shapiro made clear the low regard in which he holds pro-Palestine
campus activists. “If you had a group of white supremacists camped
out and yelling racial slurs every day, that would be met with a
different response than antisemites camped out, yelling antisemitic
tropes,” he told the _Times. _(This echoed a statement made in an
earlier interview in which he compared
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protesters to the Ku Klux Klan.) Then, in an executive order,
Shapiro updated
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administration’s code of conduct to forbid state employees from
engaging in “scandalous or disgraceful” behavior, a vaguely worded
instruction that civil libertarians immediately interpreted as
threatening pro-Palestine speech.

Shapiro is an observant Jew with personal ties to Israel; on October
7, he tweeted
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family has shared many special moments in Israel and our hearts break
for those living this horror now.” If selected as Harris’s running
mate and subsequently elected, he would become the first Jewish vice
president in American history (a distinction narrowly missed by the
late Joe Lieberman when Republicans stole the 2000 election).

CNN’s John King has already flagged
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antisemitism might make the selection of a Jewish vice presidential
candidate risky; likewise, calls from the left to oppose Shapiro risk
being branded as antisemitic. Shapiro is not, however, the only Jew
who has been suggested as a possible running mate for Harris. Illinois
Governor J.B. Pritzker has also garnered attention, and he has taken a
very different approach to this issue. Asked by the Illinois state
politics site Capitol Fax whether he agreed with Jewish organizations
calling for the resignation of Northwestern University’s president
over a pro-Palestine encampment, Pritzker replied
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“I support the Jewish organizations. I’m not about calling for
people to step down.” He also drew a distinction between antiwar,
pro-Palestinian demonstrators and “some bad actors” engaged in
antisemitism, and affirmed the need to protect free speech along with
student safety.

Most other candidates floated for the V.P. spot have also taken a far
less provocative approach to student protests than Shapiro (one
partial exception is Arizona Senator Mark Kelly, who endorsed
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campus protesters in an interview, though he hasn’t shown
Shapiro’s same level of fixation). North Carolina Governor Roy
Cooper actually drew criticism
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making no public statement about an encampment at the University of
North Carolina. Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers said
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encampments at the University of Wisconsin were “in good faith,”
even as he acknowledged they would eventually need to end. Neither
Kentucky’s Andy Beshear nor Minnesota’s Tim Walz made any public
statements about similar demonstrations in their states.

While Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer has said
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protesters showing up at University of Michigan regents’ homes
“crossed the line,” she has also been more sensitive than many in
her party. “I think the only universal truth right now is everyone
is hurting,” she said in May
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“We have a robust Jewish community in this state. We have a robust
Arab American community, Muslim community, Palestinian community …
it’s important to see the humanity and the pain that people are
feeling.”

Palestine is not Shapiro’s only progressive heresy. Just before
October 7, he drew fire
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teachers’ unions and public education advocates for supporting a
Republican-backed plan to funnel $100 million in public money to
private and religious schools. Although he was ultimately forced to
back down under pressure, many are deeply and understandably skeptical
of his commitment to public education—if Shapiro is ultimately
passed over, there is a good possibility that will be a major reason
why.

Still, his particular hostility toward pro-Palestine activists
threatens to blunt the enthusiasm among young progressive voters that
Harris has managed to generate in the past few days. It could also
undermine the Democratic ticket in Michigan, where Arab American
activists have cheered the news
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Biden’s withdrawal and are adopting a wait-and-see posture toward
Harris. Michigan Representative Rashida Tlaib, the lone Palestinian
American in Congress, is currently holding off on endorsing Harris but
has expressed interest
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with her on ending the war in Gaza.

Beyond Arab and Muslim Americans, Harris will need to mobilize
thousands of young people across the country not only to vote for her
but to knock doors, phone bank, and do all the other kinds of
grassroots volunteering that translates into a successful presidential
campaign. Younger Americans disproportionately sympathize
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Palestinians, which is one reason Biden’s approval numbers have
suffered badly over the past year. As long as U.S.-made bombs keep
falling on Gaza, this issue won’t go away—protests will haunt the
Democratic convention in Chicago next month and the beginning of the
fall term on college campuses in September, and the anniversary of the
attacks on October 7 will fall 29 days before Election Day.

Harris has a real opportunity to turn Biden’s dismal numbers around,
and has given at least some indication that she understands how. A
great deal of the excitement surrounding her candidacy from young
voters stems from the hope that she is more sensitive to ongoing
suffering in Gaza and more likely to pressure Netanyahu to end the
war. Picking Josh Shapiro as her running mate would send a very
different message, and would discourage precisely the people she needs
to ensure her victory over Trump.

_[DAVID KLION is a writer in Brooklyn. He is working on a book about
the legacy of neoconservatism. @davidklion
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* Josh Shapiro
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* Kamala Harris
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* Democratic Party
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* Stop Trump
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* 2024 Elections
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* Donald Trump
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* Israel-Gaza War
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* Ceasefire
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* Israel
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* Palestine
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* Gaza
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* Rafah
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* Benjamin Netanyahu
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* censorship
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* Academic Freedom
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* Civil Liberties
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* Freedom of Speech
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