The Kamala Harris Vibe Shift

Dianne Schwartz, an 80-year-old Chicagoan who listens to political podcasts while she exercises, felt something today. Something she hadn’t felt in a while.

“I realized today, while I was listening to my podcasts, that I spent the last few days without worrying and being depressed,” Schwartz told me. “That’s amazing.”

It wasn’t so long ago that Schwartz had resigned herself to the idea that former President Donald Trump would win in November — and that he could be the last president of her lifetime. But since President Biden bowed out of his tepid re-election campaign on Sunday, and his party instantaneously coalesced behind Vice President Kamala Harris, Schwartz has found herself feeling strangely, impossibly good about politics.

“I haven’t been this excited about an election,” Schwartz said, “since Kennedy.”

Call it the Kamala Harris vibe shift. A presidential race that felt to many Democrats like a dispiriting slog toward an all-but-certain defeat by Trump suddenly feels lighter. Hopeful. People are even feeling … is that joy?

“It was just going to be this horrible, slow slog between two old men that nobody liked,” said Lisa Burns, an art teacher from New Haven, Conn. Now, she said, “everyone I know is happy.”

“It’s gone from the dread election to the hope election, overnight,” said Amanda Litman, who runs a group that recruits progressives to run for office.