According to a former British ambassador to Washington, Donald Trump would most likely win the US presidential election on 5 November unless Democratic contender Kamala Harris fixes major problems with her campaign, who made the statement on Sunday.
According to Kim Darroch, even though Harris easily defeated Trump in last week’s televised head-to-head debate, the former Republican president is still the favorite due to two critical gaffes that Harris could make in the last weeks of the campaign.
Lord Darroch argues that, given the likelihood of a Trump reelection, Prime Minister Keir Starmer should seek a meeting with Trump and his team before election day in order to establish connections with both camps. Starmer met with US President Joe Biden and other prominent Democrats in Washington on Thursday.
If Starmer does meet one, he should meet both, writes Darroch in an Observer piece. “The Trump team will notice and be resentful if he doesn’t.”
Between 2016 until 2019, Darroch served as the ambassador of the United Kingdom to the United States. He resigned amid a controversy around the disclosure of private emails in which he harshly criticized the “clumsy and inept” Trump administration. Boris Johnson, who was running for the Tory leadership at the time but ultimately lost, neglected to offer the ambassador his full support, making Darroch’s position unsustainable.
While Trump was “a less formidable campaigner” in 2016, he is now “down on energy, more liable to become confused, with a mind cluttered with grievances,” according to Darroch, who is still a respected figure in diplomatic circles on both sides of the Atlantic. And he is still not touched by any policies.
“However,” he continues, “his ability to relate to the ‘left behind’ on a deeper level than most people can guarantees a loyal and long-lasting fan base in a nation where one-third of the workforce reports living paycheck to paycheck.”
The Democratic campaign, according to Darroch, might make two catastrophic mistakes. Darroch cautions that if Harris cannot present “some crisply worded, specific, targeted policies to bring jobs and hope back to these blighted neighbourhoods,” the electorates in the three pivotal swing states—Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Michigan—that Biden won in 2020 might return to Trump’s camp. Darroch urges Harris to maintain a “laser-focus” on these states.
The second gaffe is that, like Hillary Clinton before her, Harris seems to be avoiding the press. Trump was everywhere in 2016. Regardless of the invitation, he would gladly accept it. Unannounced, he would even call the morning news programs to share his thoughts on the events of the day. Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, isolated herself from the press and ultimately came up short.
[Harris] “seems to have adopted the Clinton playbook,” he remarks.
The UK embassy in Washington, according to Darroch, would likely advise Starmer to meet with Trump, suggesting that she take a break from this week’s UN general assembly to seek out the president.
Starting with his thoughts on Ukraine, there is a great deal to talk about with him. And many of us still think Trump will win, no matter how poorly he did in the debate or how obvious his personal collapse is. In a meeting with Harris’s campaign staff in Washington last week, Deborah Mattinson—a veteran pollster for Starmer—discussed how Labour achieved its remarkable victory by appealing to “squeezed working-class voters who wanted change,” thereby deepening ties with the Democratic party.
