A summer to remember: Political experts unpack Harris being the first woman of color on US presidential ticket and its effects on young voters

Then-Senator Kamala Harris of California (left) speaks to the press following the Democratic Presidential Debate on Oct. 15, 2019. Harris is now the first woman of color to be the Democratic candidate for president, having served as the United States’ vice president since January 2021. Credit: Casey Cascaldo | Lantern File Photo

This story is the third and final installment of a three-part series unpacking historic political news from summer 2024. Today’s story focuses on Vice President Kamala Harris being the first woman of color on a U.S. presidential ballot.

Summer 2024 may very well go down in history.

Though political tensions were rising throughout the season, three historic events — the assassination attempt on Donald Trump, President Joe Biden dropping out of the 2024 presidential race and Kamala Harris being the first woman-of-color U.S. presidential nominee — occurred in the span of nearly one month, potentially sending ripples throughout American politics for decades to come. 

Ohio State professors provide an analysis of each of these political happenings, offering their perspectives on how such consequential events may resonate with college-aged voters, affect their voting habits and even leave a lasting mark on their political outlooks.

In response to circulating claims that Harris is a “DEI pick,” or a candidate nominated solely due to her race and/or gender, Wendy Smooth — an Ohio State professor in the Department of Political Science, Department of Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies and the John Glenn School of Public Affairs — said this kind of language mirrors rhetoric used in the years following the Civil Rights Movement.

With the onset of affirmative action programs and people of color stepping into positions of power, Smooth said language like “DEI pick” was often used during that period to insinuate that those individuals were “lacking in merit” in the positions they held.

Thomas Nelson, an Ohio State professor in the Department of Political Science with research expertise in political psychology and American politics, agreed.

“I try to be pretty nonpartisan, but that is just classic Republican smear tactics, to bring up race in a way to appeal to people’s racial biases while maintaining plausible deniability,” Nelson said. “It’s like, ‘I’m not racist. I’m not attacking Harris because of her race but, yeah, I mean, it’s worth asking, is she a DEI baby?’ That’s just another way of saying she’s incompetent, she only got to where she is because of her race and gender.”

Nevertheless, Smooth said she doesn’t think college-aged voters will be swayed by these kinds of comments because of their familiarity with — and general support for — Diversity, Equity and Inclusion initiatives.

“We see a lot of energy around embracing difference, and young people, among all of our groups in U.S. society, actually have far more of a celebration of understanding cross-cultural differences, thinking about equity in rigorous ways and expect[ing] spaces that they inhabit to be inclusive spaces where everyone is at the table, because young people tend to yearn for opportunities to think beyond what they have been introduced to and get really excited about that difference,” Smooth said.

Herb Asher — a professor emeritus in the Department of Political Science with expertise in mass political behavior — agreed, and pointed to Harris’ record as a former U.S. senator, attorney general of the state of California and vice president as evidence of her being a “person of accomplishment.” Like Smooth, though, Asher said he doesn’t think the Republican Party’s tactic to discuss Harris’ race and gender will do anything to engender support, especially among young voters.

“A lot of people are giving Trump the advice, ‘Talk about issues, talk about the border, talk about inflation, talk about crime,’ but he’s not,” Asher said. “He’s not doing that, or when he does that, he steps on his own lines by resorting to just sort of personal attacks, offensive attacks. And going to your point about college students or young people in general, especially college students, going after people on grounds of identity, race, gender, sexual orientation, that’s not what young people really resonate to.”

Smooth said Harris’ campaign journey — from her candidacy announcement to her current status as the Democratic nominee — has critically energized the party, particularly its younger members.

“What we were hearing from young voters in polling data [is] that they were, prior to this summer, really quite apathetic about this election cycle — a little disgruntled about the idea that you had two quite senior, over 75 years of age, men who were running for the White House,” Smooth said. “A lot of young people were articulating that they didn’t see ways in which they could connect with the campaigns or connect with the candidacy of either side.”

Though it may not have a decisive effect on the election’s outcome, Nelson said Harris still doesn’t have a “peg,” or public persona. While Trump is known as “Mr. MAGA,” Harris remains enigmatic in her overall public perception, Nelson said.

“Sooner or later, we’re going to have a peg for Harris, and I don’t know what it’s going to be, but people are going to make fun of her — whatever the peg is, people are going to make fun of her, sure,” Nelson said. “But people might admire it too.”

Tying it all together

Though Nelson said voters aged 18-25 are one of the lowest-participating groups in the American electorate, he said college campuses are “political hot zones,” and university students are accordingly advantageous to a campaign if candidates can effectively appeal to them.

“If you can get young people energized, college-aged kids energized, they are a huge asset to a campaign because they usually are not working full time,” Nelson said. “They’ve got flexible schedules and so they can volunteer, they can go knock on doors, make phone calls.”

Similarly, Steigerwald said younger generations have historically been capable of tremendous political mobilization. He said the 1960s Cuban Missile Crisis is one prime example, as decades-long campus revolts were sparked over the atomic bomb’s creation, and college students’ feelings of powerlessness were at a high.

Steigerwald compared this “existential threat” to global climate change, and said he hopes it unites and incentivizes college-aged individuals in a related way.

“I think that [they] all are facing a kind of similar situation,” Steigerwald said. “I still sort of wistfully, romantically hope that [they’ll] collectively react against that sense of powerlessness and begin demanding — and I mean demanding — responsible leadership and genuine attempts, systematic attempts, to reel in the environmental catastrophe that is really apparent to us almost every day.”

Smooth agreed that among issues of greatest importance to college-aged voters — which include jobs, student loans and reproductive health care — the environment ranks high.

“Young people are really savvy and think very long term about the future, so questions around the environment and around sustainability will also be some really interesting questions that I think young people will be listening for and that will catch their attention, and we’ll see how their energy then falls because both candidates will need to speak to those things.”

When assessing current levels of political engagement among this younger demographic, Asher said Harris’ nomination and candidacy have changed the game.

“Now, you have a new choice,” Asher said. “And Kamala Harris comes across as a more dynamic person and comes across also as someone who might be more relatable to younger people than either Trump or Biden. And so, I think we’re seeing evidence that more people are volunteering for her campaign: more individual contributions are coming in, crowd sizes are big, enthusiasm seems higher.”

Regardless of how this summer’s political news affects the election’s outcome, Nelson said it will be interesting to analyze the long-term impacts of the past few months on new voters. In a similar way to how 9/11 and the Kennedy assassination deeply resonated with their respective generations, Nelson said the events of this summer may shape younger individuals’ political viewpoints.

“There are these sort of historical and kind of generational effects, just like something really big and significant [that] happened while you were developing as a political person, and that shapes the way you think about politics for the rest of your life,” Nelson said. “Maybe people your age, or maybe even a little bit younger, who’ve witnessed all this kind of turmoil over the summer, maybe that will have a lasting impact on their outlook.”