Publications That Backed Biden Walking Away from Harris

Kamala Harris has an endorsement problem, and it could really hurt her down the stretch.

I am of the belief that newspaper endorsements don’t really help a candidate, but when a paper declines to support a candidate in a party it has backed for decades, it will hurt them.

To that point, Harris has now been snubbed by three major publications with a history of endorsing Democrats.

Not Interested

When two major unions decided to withdraw from this election, you knew things were not going well for Harris.

The Teamsters and the Fireman’s unions both decided to sit out the election, which had to be a significant blow to Harris considering how much money Democrats funnel to unions.

Then newspapers started to announce they would be sitting out the election.

First, it was the LA Times, which only started to endorse candidates again in 2008, but it was always a Democrat.

The publication, however, decided the support of this administration for Israel was enough to pull the endorsement.

Then came the Washington Post, which not only refused to endorse Harris, but the publication also announced that it would not longer be endorsing any candidates in future elections.

Finally, this week, USA Today announced that it would not be endorsing a candidate, hitting Harris with another significant hit.

Matt Walsh, head of the School of Journalism, Media and Culture at Cardiff University, U.K., offered up his take on this, stating, "Some newspapers are refusing to risk endorsing a presidential candidate for two reasons. Firstly, this is a moral failure by newspapers, which are failing their audiences by refusing to make clear judgments about the candidates.

"But it also demonstrates the increasing weakness of legacy media—newspapers are no longer financially robust and are unwilling to risk losing subscribers by supporting candidates in a polarized election."

The three publications above were not alone, either. A handful of local papers have declined to endorse Harris after backing Biden and other Democrats before.

Some of these are the Sun Sentinel in Florida, the Minnesota Star Tribune, which is significant with its governor on the ticket, the Tampa Bay Times, and the Omaha World-Herald.

This is a case where the non-endorsements generate far more publicity than any endorsement actually would.

I won’t say it is a death blow to Harris, but it clearly gets people’s attention to make them think twice before falling off the fence on her side or Trump’s.