Kamala Harris’s visit to an abortion clinic shows she can do what Joe Biden cannot

Ahead of Vice President Kamala Harris’s visit to an abortion clinic in Minnesota, a USA TODAY/Suffolk University poll revealed that a slight majority of voters disapprove of her job performance while only 36 per cent of voters approve of her. That number is lower than the dismal 41 per cent that President Joe Biden has.

Many Democrats fear that Biden is simply too old. That’s a fear he’s openly confronted recently, including during his fiery State of the Union address. But those questions about Biden’s age carry a subtext: Democrats fear Harris is not ready to take the job. If the only issue were that Biden was too old, Democrats could breathe a sigh of relief at the idea that he could hand off the reins to Harris if he either decided not to run again or he was incapacitated or died.

The fact that they sweat Biden’s age means Democrats — no matter how much they may praise her in public — do not think she is up to the job of being at the top of the ticket, given her unpopularity. And they certainly don’t think she’s the right person to face a more emboldened Donald Trump in 2024. Indeed, that USA Today/Suffolk University poll showed 54 per cent of voters did not think she was qualified to be president.

Harris also struggles because Biden fills many of the duties that would usually go to the vice president. She only spent four years in the Senate and lacks the strong ties to the institution that allowed Biden to get Mitch McConnell and Chuck Schumer to avert a crisis. Biden’s years as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and Barack Obama’s vice president mean he also knows most heads of state — most notably, he handled the Ukraine portfolio as vice president and has known Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin