Republicans can’t ignore Kamala Harris’ biggest weakness

The 2024 presidential campaign was turned upside down last week with the withdrawal of Joe Biden from the race and the virtual coronation of Kamala Harris as his replacement. With just weeks to go until voting begins, the sprint is now on to define the presumptive Democratic nominee in the minds of voters.

Fortunately for Republicans, Harris has plenty of vulnerabilities to highlight. Despite the media’s whitewashing attempts, Harris may well be the most far-left major party presidential candidate in American history, and some GOP ads have already begun to highlight her insane positions — ranging from open-borders advocacy to discouraging meat consumption.

The Democratic Party’s ideological extremism on gender is one of its biggest vulnerabilities, and, with Harris, the party has now put it front and center.

But while exposing her extremism on immigration, crime, and energy policy may be an effective strategy, the vice president’s weaknesses go far beyond these issues. Harris also has a long history of promoting a wildly unpopular cultural agenda, one that Republicans would be foolish to ignore.

As Harris herself admitted during her failed 2020 presidential run: “Way back when, with the power that I had, I used it in a way that was about pushing forward the [transgender] movement, frankly, and the agenda.” This was a rare instance of her telling the truth.

As California’s attorney general, for example, Harris forced a policy change that allowed male prison inmates who identified as women to undergo taxpayer-funded sex-change surgeries. Her office negotiated the deal allowing the first taxpayer-funded sex-change surgery for any inmate in the United States — for convicted murderer “Shiloh Quine.”

Another inmate involved in the deal, convicted of second-degree murder, was quickly released on parole and went on to get the surgery under California’s Medicaid program. Ironically, he now believes the gender insanity in California prisons has gone too far: “I didn’t mean for this to happen. My case in 2015 opened up a doorway [and] I am waiting for the states to apologize to women.” Harris, though, apparently remains unfazed. She did mean for this to happen.

When Harris entered the Senate in 2017, she began to push the transgender agenda even further. She was a pioneer on this issue, cosponsoring bills to put transgender-identifying men in women’s sports, locker rooms, school bathrooms, domestic violence shelters, and elsewhere. She also signed on to legislation to force hospitals and doctors — including those with conscientious objections — to perform sex-change procedures, even on minor children.

As vice president, Harris has continued her far-left cultural crusade, attacking any state that has dared to fight back against gender extremism. She’s lambasted laws protecting kids from sexualized content in schools. She’s criticized policies protecting integrity and fairness in women’s sports. And she’s attacked moves by states to protect children from the horrifying medical malpractice of “gender-affirming care.”

In the meantime, the Biden-Harris administration has been busy trying to "re-interpret" existing law to accomplish what Harris couldn't in the Senate. During her time as vice president, her administration has tried to force doctors, hospitals, and insurance companies to fund or perform sex-change procedures on children. It has attempted to force schools to allow men in women's sports and private spaces. And it has even threatened to defund school lunch programs for poor children if those schools do not comply.

Unsurprisingly, all of this is deeply unpopular with the American public. Large majorities of voters oppose men in women’s sports, sex-change procedures for minors, and inappropriate gender content in schools. And as Republicans like Glenn Youngkin and Ron DeSantis have shown, candidates who run on these issues can be very successful, even appealing to those beyond the traditional GOP base.

Although Democrats want voters to view Kamala Harris as a fresh face and a reset for the party’s ticket, the truth is that she has been a leading figure for years in the far left’s culture war on American families. The Democratic Party’s ideological extremism on gender is one of its biggest vulnerabilities, and, with Harris, the party has now put it front and center. With the election now up for grabs after last week’s unprecedented events, Republicans cannot afford to let this advantage go to waste.