How Trump Accidentally Let His Biggest Advantage Over Harris Slip Away

But Democrats, goes this theory, have fixated on those things at their peril. As a result, the party is neglecting the authentic material concerns of working-class voters, which Trump is exploiting with populist bombast aimed squarely at those concerns, which—however demagogic it may be—is filling a void left open by Democrats, putting him on the cusp of victory yet again.

All these ad expenditures call this into serious question. Instead, if the election goes well for Harris, it will demonstrate that holding the forces of rising authoritarianism at bay requires appealing to numerous voter groups spanning the center-left and center right—and that a multiplicity of messages is required to reach them.

For instance, right-leaning independents and moderate Republicans—especially affluent suburbanites—who have supported GOP economics all their lives might need to be nudged into Harris’s camp by reminders of Trump’s fondness for violence, authoritarian threats, sexual predations, and open boasts about taking reproductive rights away from half the population. Those voters might respond more to those things than, say, working-class voters who are more motivated by nostalgia for the good pre-Covid economy, and thus need more direct populist reassurances.