By MICHAEL SCHREIBER
Nov. 5—Speaking in Philadelphia on Monday night, Kamala Harris called the presidential contest “the most consequential election of our lifetime.” Not to be undone, Donald Trump told a crowd in Reading, Pa., “Nov. 5 will be the most important day in the history of our country.” Of course, readers might recall that politicians and the media said the same thing in 2020, in 2016, and even before that.*
Nevertheless, there is no doubt that the U.S. ruling class believes that the presidential election holds great portent for an economy that is suffering from extremely weighty pressures. Rana Faroohar, writing in The Financial Times on Nov. 3, summed up some of the major concerns of U.S. capitalism: “On Tuesday, Americans will vote in what will probably be the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes [there’s that cliché again!]. The candidates couldn’t be more different, but the challenge left to them will be the same—how to renew a sense of national purpose and dynamism in a country that may well have reached the peak of its competitive powers. America is still enjoying its post-pandemic growth spurt. But major economic, political and social headwinds lie ahead.
“Partisan politics will not end with this election; indeed, they may get worse. Productivity is slowing, the population is ageing, social media silo-bubbles create division and the country faces competitive threats from China and other emerging markets, which are increasingly banding together in their own post-Washington consensus alliances.”
That’s how most capitalists understand the stakes: They see the prospect of major crises ahead, which will need strong and even harsh measures to overcome. And they want a White House administration (and a Congress) that can do the job. For many capitalists, “partisan politics” are a secondary matter; they donate money to both parties with the expectation that both will bow to their interests. Studies have shown that donations from corporations and business-related associations are just about equally as generous to both the Republicans and the Democrats.
But how do working people fare in this election? For the working class, as always, the outcome will be bleak no matter which of the two big capitalist parties wins. Both presidential candidates, and their parties, represent and respond to the narrow interests of the wealthy elite—despite the mask that their candidates put on at election time to pretend that they somehow speak for the interests of those who must work for a living.
Since workers and oppressed people lack an independent party of their own, they are forced to watch the boxing match that the two parties stage every election season. At the end of the contest, working people are asked to choose between the candidates. After judging whether the candidates are apt to keep at least some of their snake-oil promises, the choice often boils down to which one they think might be the “lesser evil.”
So, will it be Trump or Harris who gains the position of heading up the political administration of U.S. capitalism? Most of the polls indicate that the result will be extremely close. Let’s take a snapshot look at what the two Big Business candidates are promising to the electorate:
Trump’s platform
This time, as in the last two presidential elections, the Republican Party ticket is headed by a buffoon and scoundrel—a racist, a liar, an abuser of women, a social reactionary, a staunch pal of white supremacists and the far right, and a wannabe authoritarian strongman.
Nevertheless, Trump, like a carnival barker, has appealed to voters with the vision of a glittering future once he is re-installed in the White House. According to pre-election polls, he has won over a strong contingent of working-class voters with his promises in regard to the economy.
Trump has reinforced his campaign by building on the fact that, as recorded by a New York Times/Siena College poll in October, 75 percent of voters say the economy is in bad shape. Just last week, after a report from the Labor Department had showed anemic growth in employment—in part because of hurricanes and the Boeing strike—Trump crowed: “That brand-new jobs report proves decisively that Kamala Harris and Crooked Joe have driven our economy off the cliff.”
Trump’s main recipe to gain more jobs is to boost U.S. industry by imposing tariffs on foreign-made products to an unheard of extent. “We will not let countries come in, take our jobs, and plunder our nation,” Trump has said. “The way they will sell their product in America is to build it in America, very simple.” Left unsaid is the degree to which Trump’s plan of added tariffs would contribute to inflation.
At the same time, he affirms, the Trump White House will nurture U.S. industrial production by slashing taxes, rolling back Biden’s electric vehicle incentives, and expanding fossil fuel production with an environment-be-damned “drill, baby, drill” policy. Along the way, he has assured working people, he would eliminate taxes on tips, overtime, and social security.
Immigration has also been at the center of Trump’s rhetoric. In order to counter the alleged “invasion” of the United States by immigrants, he will “seal the border” while undertaking the largest mass deportation of immigrants in U.S. history.
Trump declares that he will end the war in Ukraine “in the first 24 hours” of his presidency. He will take quick and severe measures to clear out the “rogue bureaucrats” as well as the Deep State “enemies” who have corrupted the federal government. Trump also promises to cut federal funding to schools that teach about trans rights and “critical race theory” and says that he would even “protect women” in some unspecified manner
Harris’s platform
The Democratic Party is opposing Trump with a candidate who is far less crude in her speeches but generally offers a continuation of the predatory capitalist and imperialist policies of her predecessor, including active support to the genocidal atrocities of the Israeli state. At the same time, she offers very little to augment social programs at home or any real efforts to deal with the climate emergency that threatens the planet.
Harris’s promises to the electorate have been much more modest than her opponent’s. In general, she has been running as the “non-Trump” candidate, who will protect “our democratic values” against “division, chaos, and distrust”—and even challenge Trump’s “fascism.” “Fight for freedom!” she proclaims at her rallies.
Her major commitment has been to sign a law restoring the right to abortion, if Congress enacts such a measure (which is doubtful). But in general, despite the signature call of her campaign for a “fresh start, a new way forward,” Harris has indicated that few changes from the policies of Biden would take place under her watch.
Like Biden, Harris tried to assure voters that economic problems in the United States are not nearly as bad as some make them out to be. It is hard to deny, however, that inflation soared due to the COVID pandemic and the supply problems that followed, rising to a degree unmatched in 40 years. Skyrocketing prices of food, gas, and other necessities were soon augmented by ballooning mortgage rates and insurance premiums. Moreover, the Biden administration allowed the tax subsidies in its American Rescue Plan to elapse at the end of 2021, which caused child poverty to increase once again.
In poll after poll, people state that they are suffering from price rises—and a strong percentage say that they “did better under Trump.” Accordingly, Harris affirms that she “has heard” the complaints of working people and the “middle class,” and that “our biggest challenge is to lower costs.” In order to do that, she pledges to induce the big pharma companies to lower prices and—in some unclear manner—to ban price gouging on groceries. But at the same time, she repeatedly reassures big business that nothing she is proposing would be too thoroughgoing or radical. “I’m a capitalist,” she proudly informed business leaders in Pittsburgh.
Unlike some candidates in earlier Democratic campaigns, Harris now ignores any mention of expanding the Affordable Care Act, and she outright opposes plans for single-payer health insurance (i.e., Bernie Sanders’ past slogan of “Medicare for All”). She has promised that 10 million new homes would be constructed under her administration, but the task would apparently be left to private industry to fulfill; the federal government is no longer in the business of constructing affordable housing. The Green New Deal, which Harris endorsed four years ago though it was in itself an inadequate response to climate change, has now been forgotten (except as a stalking horse for Trump). And the so-called “left” of the Democratic Party—Sanders and the Squad—are rarely heard from anymore, having been pulled into the mainstream behind Harris.
As the campaign season progressed, and Harris became slightly more explicit about her proposals, she moved more and more to the right. Her rightward drift can be seen in regard to several issues. In 2020, in a nod to concerns over climate change, she said she was against fracking; now she merely says that she believes the U.S. should draw from a variety of power sources, and that the use of fossil fuels should not be excluded. At one point, during the height of the George Floyd protests, she professed to be for defunding the police; now she stresses her pro-cop credentials as a prosecutor in California.
Harris has even tried to outdo Trump in promising to clamp down on immigration. She now endorses constructing more walls across the southern border, a measure that the Democrats opposed when Trump attempted it. In her speeches, she repeatedly praises the horribly restrictive “bipartisan” border bill that Trump pushed his minions in Congress to shoot down earlier this year. And no longer do the Democrats talk of forging a “pathway to citizenship” for immigrants, refugees, and DREAMERS.
Aside from a few words of sympathy for the 42,000 Palestinians slaughtered by Israel’s incursion into Gaza, Harris differs little from Biden (or Trump) in her support to apartheid Israel. She has doubled down on her pledge to keep supplying Israel with weapons in its murderous war against the Palestinians, its invasion of Lebanon, and its missile attack on Iran.
While Harris’s utterances on foreign policy might not be as shrilly nationalistic as those of Donald Trump, the perspectives of the two candidates do not diverge very much in substance. Both Harris and Trump (as with Biden) intend to pursue, if not ratchet up, the increasingly militaristic “Great Game” of inter-imperialist rivalries and trade wars. Whereas Trump apparently feels he could manipulate this country’s imperialist competitors by bullying—and perhaps get his way with Putin and Xi though a combination of flattery and threats—Biden and Harris appear to stand by the old Teddy Roosevelt colonialist slogan of “speak softly and carry a big stick.” In her address to the Democratic National Convention, Harris vowed: “As commander-in-chief, I will ensure America always has the strongest, most lethal fighting force in the world.”
Meanwhile in the campaign, Harris’s watchwords have now become “cooperation” and “consensus.” And in that spirit, she has offered Republicans a full “seat at the table” (including a cabinet post). Dozens of neo-con politicians and ex-military brass have taken the olive branch and flocked to the Harris campaign. One can speculate that this movement toward the Democrats has taken place not only because they fear Trump’s antics such as cozying up to rulers like Putin and Xi might tear apart their own projects but also because they see some confluence with the policies of the Democratic Party—especially in the matter of enforcing U.S. political, economic, and military hegemony in the world.
As a consequence of the neo-con movement toward the Democrats, former Republican Senator Liz Cheney—who still disagrees with Harris on the question of reproductive rights—is a frequent speaker at her campaign rallies. And former Vice President Dick Cheney, one of the architects of the U.S. invasion of Iraq and considered a war criminal by many people, has likewise become a vocal Harris supporter.
Which way for working people?
For many months, working-class voters have been bombarded by propaganda distributed by the partisans of Harris and Trump. Both candidates and their parties profess that they will provide a glorious “new future” for the country, which will give working people all they need. And the only thing that working people have to do is to come into the fold and vote them into office.
Unfortunately, the candidates’ promises are hollow. History shows that when the chips are down, both the Republicans and the Democrats always sacrifice the interests of working people in order to enable Big Business to keep humming smoothly and profitably.
Despite the millions of dollars that most unions pour into the campaigns of the Democratic Party, and despite all of the union members who go door to door stomping for Democratic candidates, elected Democrats generally give short shrift to the demands of union members at contract time. When called upon, Democratic and Republican administrations alike will send in the cops or National Guard to break up strike picket lines. Or they will appoint cumbersome arbitration boards to shove down the throats of the workers a contract that doesn’t really meet their needs.
It’s a matter of class loyalty; both parties serve the interests of the wealthy, not those of working people—and neither Trump nor Harris are any different.
No matter who wins today’s election, our best option for achieving meaningful change is to stay in the streets. We need to build giant protest movements that can make it clear to the profit-hungry rulers of this country that if they don’t fulfill our demands, they will be swallowed up by rebellion.
And finally: The systematic oppression and exploitation of U.S. working people will only change when the victims, in their millions, break with the two big capitalist parties and build their own independent party. We need a militant working-class party that fights every day for the oppressed and exploited and looks to the inauguration of a workers’ government.
NOTE:
*Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden tweeted in October 2020, “There’s just one month left before the most important election in our lifetime.” Bernie Sanders echoed him two days later “This is the most important election, not only in our lifetime but in the modern history of our country.” In 2016, Donald Trump said, “This is by far the most important vote you’ve ever cast for anyone at any time.” The cliché is repeated in almost all presidential elections.
Graphic: The Financial Times via Getty Images