OPINION:
In 2019, when then-Sen. Kamala Harris announced her campaign for president, she was immediately crowned “the one to beat” by all the political experts in Washington. She checked all the Democrats’ boxes and had all the depth, charm, gravitas and smarts to clear the field and beat then-President Donald Trump.
Looking back, the coverage of her announcement was comically absurd.
The New York Times compared her to Martin Luther King Jr.
U.S. News & World Report’s senior politics writer declared that Ms. Harris’ campaign would be “the standard” to which all future campaigns would aspire.
“Harris is clearly comfortable in her own skin, and in interview after interview, her natural charisma and ability to connect shined through with ease,” he wrote. “She’s also blessed with a[n] infectious laugh that will come in handy when the inevitable attacks against her strengthen.”
Reading those words today, it almost seems like the writer was mocking her. He wasn’t, of course. It was his very best political analysis — an analysis that was shared by nearly every other political expert in Washington at the time.
Of course, cruel reality had other ideas for Kamala Harris. So did Democratic voters. She struggled to connect with ordinary Americans.
After an initial explosion of funding by powerful party donors, the money ran dry. She came off as slippery — a shallow opportunist — in debates. Her campaign went bust before the first ballot was cast.
She failed to earn one single delegate.
In the end, all Ms. Harris had left were her checked boxes, which turned out to be her most valuable asset anyway.
Today, she is a verbally incontinent, flailing embarrassment in the White House. Her cackling attempts to be more likable sound like nails on a chalkboard to many voters.
Her only political accomplishment — and it is a damned Herculean miracle — is somehow managing to keep President Biden from being the most unpopular person in the White House.
It should be noted that the same political experts who crowned Kamala Harris the next president in 2019 also declared Hillary Clinton the next president when she announced her first campaign way back in January 2007.
Whoops! Or, more accurately, double whoops!
Surveying the political field today, all these same experts who were so disastrously wrong about Ms. Harris and Mrs. Clinton have been promoted to enjoy even greater latitude in predicting the next “one to beat.” But this time, it’s in the Republican primary race.
All the same political experts who missed the rise of Donald Trump and so badly whiffed on Kamala Harris and Hillary Clinton have been insisting for the better part of a year now that the next “future of the party” is Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.
Mr. DeSantis was all the Trump policies, they told us, without Donald Trump — the mean tweeter. American voters would just love Ron DeSantis.
The only problem — once again — was that nobody checked with actual American voters on this.
It is certainly true that Mr. DeSantis has a powerful record to run on. But, of course, so does Mr. Trump. Just ask anyone suffering under “Bidenomics” today.
And it is true that Mr. DeSantis has demonstrated significant political prowess. But, of course, so has Donald Trump. Don’t forget: Mr. DeSantis never would have been elected governor of Florida in the first place without the endorsement and support of Mr. Trump.
And there is no greater display of political prowess than Mr. Trump’s 2016 stunning victory that, even today, many political experts refuse to accept.
Now, polls are almost always ridiculous — especially those taken half a year before a political contest.
But trends tend not to lie. The trouble for Mr. DeSantis is that the polls show his support from actual voters vanishing the longer he is in the race.
This raises a painful question: Is Ron DeSantis the Kamala Harris of this election cycle?
It would not be the first time all the political experts in Washington got it all wrong.
• Charles Hurt is the opinion editor at The Washington Times.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.