OPINION:
You can learn a lot about Kamala Harris from the people backing her presidential bid.
Last month, she received the tax man’s formal endorsement. National Treasury Employees Union chief Doreen Greenwald said the vice president “shares our values.”
For thousands of years, those values haven’t been popular. The Bible lists tax collectors alongside robbers, evildoers and adulterers. The Good Book does grudgingly admit that tax collectors are capable, with God’s assistance, of turning to the side of virtue.
But IRS agents aren’t endorsing the Democratic nominee’s religious piety. They’re excited about Ms. Harris expanding their numbers and enhancing their power to audit anyone who crosses the administration. The same “virtue” has attracted world leaders with an authoritarian streak.
Russian President Vladimir Putin offered his take on the U.S. presidential race last month at the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok.
“If I could name a favorite candidate, it used to be Joe Biden, but now he’s not participating in the campaign,” the strongman said. “He recommended that all of his allies to support Ms. Harris, so that’s what we’re going to do. Her laugh is so fascinating. It means that everything is good.”
Mr. Putin’s newfound allies in Iran are even more enthusiastic about supporting Ms. Harris. According to the FBI, Iranian agents snooped on Mr. Trump’s emails and forwarded the juicy bits to the Democratic campaign. It was only eight years ago when the mere “suggestion of a suggestion” of international election interference of this sort triggered a media and legal firestorm.
Mr. Trump had been falsely accused of colluding with Russia to obtain help with his successful 2016 bid. Donald Trump Jr. was said to be part of the scheme because he spoke with a Russian woman claiming to have dirt on Hillary Clinton. The woman had no such information. It was a ruse used to set up a meeting at Trump Tower to lobby against the Magnitsky Act, a statute used to sanction Russians.
Jeff Sessions, Mr. Trump’s first attorney general, also had to essentially give up his job because he was once in the same room with a Russian ambassador.
Some 350 “national security leaders” from both political parties endorsed Ms. Harris, and many of them pushed the Russian interference fairy tale. Several signatures on the new letter also appeared on the 2020 letter falsely claiming Hunter Biden’s laptop was disinformation created in Moscow. These deceits were crafted to boost the candidate promoting endless foreign conflict.
That’s also why erstwhile Republicans such as former Vice President Dick Cheney and former Rep. Liz Cheney, his daughter, back Ms. Harris. As prominent members of the military-industrial complex, the family benefits financially from perpetual strife abroad.
But not everyone who backs the Democratic candidate is free to make a formal endorsement. New York Judge Juan Merchan ignored state ethics rules to make a small-money contribution to the Democratic campaign before making an invaluable in-kind donation to Ms. Harris by convicting Mr. Trump over an accounting error that was beyond the statute of limitations. His honor converted this misdemeanor into a felony — just in time for the election.
Ryan Routh apparently had a far more sinister form of interference in mind. The man accused of attempting to assassinate Mr. Trump had a “Biden-Harris” sticker on his pickup truck.
With friends like these, Ms. Harris doesn’t need enemies.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.