Since President Joe Biden stepped down as the Democratic Party’s nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris has the wind at her back. She has captured momentum, money, and the media’s attention. It also appears that many voters are rewarding the Democrats for changing the top of their ticket.

But in an election that is likely to come down to a few thousand votes in five or so states, the question remains: Will the electorate reward or punish Harris for her flip-flopping on the top issue concerning voters?

In February, Gallup noted that “immigration” surged as the leader in its Top of Most Important Problem List.  Gallup also released a poll just last month which showed that 55% of Americans want immigration levels reduced, the highest since 2001, and up from 41% last year.

The country’s feelings about immigration run counter to what Harris was selling during her 2019 Democratic presidential primary race: she supported decriminalizing illegal entry to the U.S. and even backed offering healthcare to those who entered illegally.

Back in 2021, Biden tasked his vice president to address the root causes of mass migration from Central and South America. In 2023, the Border Patrol’s employee union called out Harris’ inaction with the border crisis, tweeting: “If you were given a job 2 years ago with the explicit goal of reducing illegal immigration, and then you sit around and do nothing while illegal immigration explodes to levels never seen before, you should be fired and replaced. Period.”

Now, as the Democratic presidential nominee, Harris has done a 180-degree turn on immigration and border security. At a recent rally in Arizona, Politico reported, Harris messaged the following points to the crowd: highlighting her record as AG of “border state” California in combating transnational crime; promising to fight for “strong border security”; attacking Trump for killing bipartisan border legislation earlier this year; and promising to sign a similar bill if she became president.

In a recent Bulwark podcast, statistician and founder of the polling analysis website FiveThirtyEight, Nate Silver attempted to describe Harris’ underperformance as vice president as opposed to her current overperformance as a presidential candidate.

“And then I kind of wonder if, like, how much the White House, while she (Harris) was vice president, was trying to stymie her or limit her,” Silver said. “She got some rough assignments, like the border and, like, voting rights, which is not inherently a tough assignment, but the one thing they weren’t able to really do anything about.”

To be clear, this was Silver’s personal opinion. But when pundits and political professionals use the term “rough assignment” to describe only one duty, it does not give voters much confidence that Harris can handle all the other facets of the job were she to win the presidency.

The Trump campaign, meanwhile, is struggling to find a coherent message and its top messenger is deeply flawed. Therefore, for the very fact that she is not Trump, Harris’s immigration flip flops may not matter in the end.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch/Tribune News Service