Last week, former Vice President and 2024 Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris made an appearance at the Leading Women Defined Summit, during which she made her first public remarks about Donald Trump’s presidency. Most notably, she said: “There were many things that we knew would happen. I’m not here to say I told you so.” Afterwards, she laughed and received resounding cheers from the audience in attendance.

Despite losing the last election, Harris — like Hillary Clinton before her — is exhibiting little self-reflection about her defeat and has instead chosen to chastise voters for choosing Trump over her. The “I told you so” remarks are a slightly less caustic version of a common refrain among progressives today: “I hope Trump voters get what they deserve.”

Trump not only won, but won the popular vote and made substantial inroads with longtime Democratic constituencies, including non-white working-class voters. Since election day, some voices in and adjacent to the party have made calls for genuine introspection. Many, however, appear to be resting on their laurels, resisting calls for major change and instead hoping to capitalise on anti-Trump backlash to lead them to victory in off-year elections and next year’s midterms.

For one thing, this kind of response fails to take any responsibility for the undeniably weak Biden and Harris campaigns. Harris closed out her campaign accusing Trump of being a fascist, exposing the cognitive dissonance with which some Democrats now operate: if Trump is in fact taking America towards fascism, then smugness is not an appropriate response. If he isn’t, then the Democrats should likewise be less smug, because that means their attack line was not only ineffective but false.

Even beyond questions about campaign strategy, there is still no real sign that Harris or her allies have grappled with the more substantive reasons for the Democrats’ unpopularity. The former VP gave no mention of the erosion of support among working-class voters and racial minorities, the public’s very real anger over high inflation and a leaky border, or the perception that she and her party are out of step with the electorate on key cultural issues.

One Democrat who has at least made an attempt to understand his opponents’ appeal is Gavin Newsom. The California Governor has invited several Trump-world figures onto his new podcast, including Charlie Kirk, Michael Savage, and Steve Bannon. To allow for genuine consideration of guests’ views, the discussions so far have not been oppositional, and Newsom gives his interlocutors ample opportunity to say their piece. Though his guests are unlikely to drastically change the California Governor’s mind, there is some virtue to the project: Newsom is displaying a curiosity in his opponents missing in a lot of Democrats. Moreover, it’s much harder to defeat someone if you don’t understand them or why they appeal to so many others.

Democrats have their work cut out for them to find stable success at the national level. Recent migration trends will make it even harder for them to win the Electoral College after 2030, and the Senate’s rural bias means the party will struggle to consistently win a majority in that chamber if it can’t make inroads with small-town voters. A focus on rectifying these problems is a more electorally sound — and morally justifiable — strategy than continuing to blame voters who supported Trump for the country’s problems.

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Michael Baharaeen is chief political analyst at The Liberal Patriot substack.

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