Why Did Democratic Senate Candidates Win MI, AZ, NV and WI But Harris Lost?

I have yet to see historian Heather Cox Richardson in her daily Letter from an American offer an analysis of WHY Kamala Harris lost, other than to suggest the dominance of right-wing media disinformation in misleading people. It's not as simple as that.

I notice, in the comments on HCR’s Substack, a deep bitterness and disillusionment with the American people, and consequently democracy itself. While I share the disappointment, we'd do well to show curiosity about why the American people chose as they did, rather than simply projecting that they are all stupid, Trump cult members, misogynists, and bigots.

I am as disappointed as any other Kamala Harris supporter that saving democracy from the criminal and corrupt Donald Trump and saving Ukraine from Vladimir Putin’s aggression didn’t resonate with swing voters. I’m sorry they weren’t persuaded by economic statistics indicating that inflation is fading, and seem to believe the U.S. is in recession though officially it is not.

This may be par for the course. In 1992, as James Carville advised, “It’s the economy stupid.” His boss Bill Clinton beat George H.W. Bush because the voters thought the economy was still in recession. It wasn’t.

In 2008, voters held George W. Bush, John McCain, and other Republicans responsible for the Great Recession and the bailout of the big banks, an indication that the so-called free market was rigged in favor of the wealthy. It was more complicated than that, but Barack Obama won 53 percent, an electoral landslide and Democrats won both houses of Congress by wide margins.

Blaming the voters is not a comeback strategy. In 2024, Democrats won senatorial elections in MI, AZ, WI, NV, and MI -- if Harris won those states, she would have won the election. Why didn’t she?

Michigan elected a Democrat Senator but not Harris for president.