US election shifts and India

New Delhi must sustain its bipartisan support in the US through broad political and civil society engagement

On Thursday this week, Kamala Harris will be formally anointed as the nominee of the Democratic Party for the presidential elections in November.

The Democratic Party Convention underway in Chicago will mark the culmination of a remarkably successful campaign by Ms Harris, jettisoning her image as a bland and pedestrian political figure and a mostly invisible Vice-President under Joe Biden, the incumbent President.

Her swift and uncontested endorsement as Democratic Party nominee once Mr Biden bowed to pressure within his party to withdraw from the race, was unexpected. The flood of cash that began to flow into her campaign was almost spectacular. For weeks, the insiders in the Biden administration had insisted that the President had to seek a second term precisely because the default choice in his place would be Kamala Harris who was not "made of presidential material" and could not stop Donald Trump, the Republican candidate, from an easy victory in the elections. And now she is leading Mr Trump in the opinion polls. The political momentum is on her side.

She has generated a feelgood sentiment across the country and barring any serious mis-steps in the six weeks left for the campaign, she could well be America's first woman President and a mixed-race one to boot. That she has come so close to the prize is testimony to the remarkable American capacity for political renewal against what at times appear to be overwhelming odds. For much of the world Kamala Harris becoming US President will bring a huge sense of relief. So, along with a large segment of the American voting public, many leaders across geographies and the ideological spectrum will be rooting for her.