Perusing the Colgate Bookstore, I opened up the front cover of Kamala Harris’ 107 Days. The jacket flap read like a thriller: “On July 21, 2024, your running mate, Joe Biden, announces that he will not be seeking reelection. The presidential election will occur on November 5, 2024. You have 107 days.”
I remember those 107 days quite well. In this book, Harris’s compelling voice takes us on the campaign trail, through the highs and lows. With the shortest campaign in modern presidential history, Harris was a candidate who showcased the impressive strength and flexibility required to run as the leader of a major party ticket. In her retelling of events, she reveals a few of the slights she felt along the way. Predictably, Harris cites the lack of time as making it hard for her to cover all her bases.
“I had to triage issues so that key information could sink in,” she writes.
With this book, she had the opportunity to set the record straight and establish her image. I was hoping for something different—perhaps something that felt more authentic and raw. I wished she would capture the moments of exhaustion, doubt, revelation, vulnerability, problem-solving and true strategy.
What I loved—and left me wanting more—were the details we didn’t already know. For example, Harris outlines the subterfuges required for her own VP interview process. “Getting to my interview with Joe was choreographed like a spy movie,” she writes. Personal insights and fun moments like that stood out to me.
Anecdotes from interactions with politicians were a main feature of the book, making it a dishy and incisive memoir. This aspect made it an exciting read—I turned the pages the fastest when she talked about her interactions with her own party. She includes a text sent to her by Bernie Sanders, who warned her to pay attention to the working class: “I supported Joe because he was the strongest voice for the working class. Please focus on the working class, not just on abortion,” he told her.
Other politicians weren’t as helpful. She mentions how Gavin Newsom told her, “‘Hiking. Will call back.’ (He never did.)” Her writing reveals her true colors, as well as those of her political allies, particularly when she recounts the process of selecting a vice president. She disclosed that Pete Buttigieg was her first choice.
“He would have been an ideal partner — if I were a straight white man,” she writes.
Because she was a woman of color, and he was a gay man, she thought the American voters would not accept that level of diversity.
Later, she narrowed her VP picks to three democrats: Josh Shapiro, governor of Pennsylvania, Tim Walz, governor of Minnesota and Mark Kelly, a senator from Arizona.
In the VP interview process, she digs at Shapiro, making him out to be ego-centric. “I had a nagging concern that he would be unable to settle for a role as number two and that it would wear on our partnership,” she writes. Harris speaks highly of Walz, calling him authentic and self-depricating in a genuine way. The use of these descriptions of other politicians was strategic: both the positive and negative portraits of others are used to highlight her own merits. I read the digs at her political peers in the Democratic Party as harsh and as an effort to improve her own image in the wake of her election defeat.
Harris’ writing is sharp, but feels message-disciplined. One would expect a slight switch-up when laying bare a full-out sprint to a crushing defeat, but her words remain quite carefully chosen. The memoir recounted all her political experiences and maintained a highly polished image of herself. It seems like resume stacking to list out many of her accomplishments dating back to her college days. And while it may seem like we get real insights into the campaign, they were too few and far between.
A significant part of the book focuses on Harris’ relationship with Biden and her efforts to differentiate herself from him, a place where she seemed to falter during the campaign trail. She maintains dignity and respect for Biden, but traces of resentment seep through the pages.
Overall, 107 Days reads like a thriller, especially at the beginning. It feels like we are reliving the campaign, with a few new, refreshing, and personal insights.
Rating: 4/5
