Donald Trump didn’t expect Joe Biden to pick Kamala Harris as his running mate. “He thought Biden would choose Karen Bass,” a Republican briefed on Trump’s thinking said. Trump’s view, according to sources close to the White House, was that Biden would prefer a candidate with Bass’s low national profile and one who wouldn’t outshine him. Trump was also hopeful that Bass, a California congresswoman, would join the ticket given her record of making positive comments about the late Cuban dictator Fidel Castro. “Trump thought Bass would help him with the Cubans in Florida,” the source said.
Trump advisers are split over Biden’s decision to nominate Harris, the first Black and South Asian woman on a major party ticket. Some see the California senator as a Barack Obama–level star and skilled debater who will appeal to a changing America. “The demographics favor the Democrats. Trump still thinks this is Ronald Reagan’s America, and it’s not,” said the Republican source. “The other problem is the campaign risks a backlash in the #MeToo age if they attack her too personally.”
Other Trumpworld insiders are thrilled at the opportunity to define Harris as a radical leftist, a portrayal echoed Tuesday night on Fox News. “She’s going to help with the base, and that’s where it ends,” a Trump adviser predicted. “She’ll scare the shit out of suburban women. How great is this?” Trump has taken to stoking fears that a Biden victory will fuel unrest in “Democrat-run cities,” a barely disguised racist appeal that he picked up again on Wednesday morning following the Harris announcement. “The ‘suburban housewife’ will be voting for me,” he tweeted. The adviser added that Biden would soon regret choosing a high-wattage running mate. “This is not Mike Pence to Donald Trump or Joe Biden to Obama. Kamala is going to be the candidate. She’ll be constantly overshadowing him. In three to four weeks, Biden is going to realize he made a dumb move.”
At his press briefing on Tuesday, Trump called Harris “nasty,” a preview of the misogynist playbook he’s likely to follow in the months ahead. According to sources who have spoken with Trump, his view of the race is increasingly optimistic. Sources said he’s been pleased so far with new campaign manager Bill Stepien and senior strategist Jason Miller, and sees the numbers in swing states improving. “Trump thinks the polls are tightening,” a Republican close to the campaign told me.
One reason for Trump’s optimism may be that he’s living in a right-wing-media bubble where Biden is presented as a cartoon of a doddering old man controlled by antifa, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez—and now Harris. (“Slow Joe” and “Phony Kamala” is how the campaign is already framing the pair.) “Trump keeps asking people, when are voters going to realize Biden is mentally out to lunch?” a Republican briefed on the conversations told me. “But he’s only seeing clips of Biden screwing up.”
As Trump blasts Biden’s age and absence from the trail, Trump campaign staffers are privately frustrated that the president is refusing to get out there himself. Since his disastrous and sparsely attended Tulsa rally in June, Trump has largely cocooned himself inside the White House, leaving only for a few public events and visits to his private clubs. “Trump has told the campaign he only wants to do one or two events a week. They keep putting ideas in front of him, and he is telling them ‘no,’” a Republican close to the campaign told me. One Republican close to the West Wing speculated that Trump doesn’t like doing small events like factory visits because they promote other people’s companies. “He thinks, Why should I do that?” the Republican said.