Tim Walz is the Democratic veepstakes winner

Happy Tuesday and welcome to US Election Countdown! We start with breaking news: Kamala Harris has chosen Minnesota governor Tim Walz as her running mate, according to a person familiar with the matter. We’ll have more on the decision throughout the day on FT.com. In the meantime let’s dig into:

Economic storm clouds are swirling over the White House race.

Global stock market turmoil has combined with lacklustre domestic employment data to spark worries about the US slipping into recession. But even if the current turbulence calms and the economy continues what so far has seemed like a soft landing, Donald Trump is already trying to hammer Kamala Harris on the market and economy.

“TRUMP CASH vs. KAMALA CRASH”, the Republican nominee posted to his Truth Social platform yesterday. “VOTERS HAVE A CHOICE — TRUMP PROSPERITY, OR THE KAMALA CRASH & GREAT DEPRESSION OF 2024.”

“Of course there is a massive market downturn. Kamala is even worse than Crooked Joe . . . You can’t play games with MARKETS.”

The economy was one of Joe Biden’s weakest points during his re-election bid, as Americans, weighed down by high prices, held negative views about his economic stewardship.

Harris had a brief opening to distance herself from these perceptions, but now the greying picture threatens to spoil her campaign honeymoon. Here’s what the FT’s Washington bureau chief James Politi had to say about the downturn:

For Republicans to assail Harris over the dismal day on Wall Street glosses over the fact that Biden’s presidency has coincided with a steady rally in equity prices even as the economy was hit by high inflation and high interest rates, so share prices are falling off very high levels. And one-day stock market tumbles like the one on Monday brought back grim memories of difficult days for investors during the Trump administration, both during the pandemic and during the trade war with China. 

But if the market distress continues, and is accompanied by a sharp slowdown in the economy that the Fed is unable to correct, it could become a major headache for Harris in the final stretch of the election, forcing her on the defensive. And she’ll have little room to manoeuvre given that Republicans controlling the House of Representatives will be unlikely to enact any stimulus policies.

Campaign clips: the latest election headlines

• As Fed officials tried to reassure markets, Chicago Fed president Austan Goolsbee said yesterday the US central bank would “fix” deterioration in the US economy, adding that it did not appear to be in recession.

• The Trump campaign has failed to find an effective response to the Democrats’ “weird” attacks. [Free to read]

• Take a closer look at the party divisions Harris has faced in her search for a running mate. (NYT)

• Dive into this profile of Robert F Kennedy Jr, who threatens to syphon off votes from the two leading candidates. (New Yorker)

• RJK Jr, who counts an emu and falcons among his pets, also admitted he dumped a dead bear in New York’s Central Park 10 years ago. (Politico)

• Harris has closer ties to Wall Street than many realise. (WSJ)

Behind the scenes

As Trump fights to wrestle the spotlight back from Harris, it’s become apparent how much the vice-president has rattled his cage. His latest attempt to win the attention war has backfired, say political analysts.

“He’s clearly unnerved. And when Trump is unnerved he becomes verbally undisciplined and hostile,” Doug Schoen, a veteran political consultant told the FT’s Joshua Chaffin. Schoen was baffled by the ex-president’s decision to question Harris’s racial identity and disparage panel moderators at a conference for Black journalists last week.

“It was politically maladroit, at best,” he said. “Politically toxic, at worst. But impossible to fathom in any logical or reasonable way.”

Hank Sheinkopf, another strategist, agreed. “What would you do if you’d spent tens-of-millions of dollars . . . to defeat Joe Biden, and suddenly he’s not there?” he asked. “They have to come up with a new plan.”

Further, some top Republicans are questioning whether Trump’s campaign has miscalculated by focusing its messaging on the Maga base, rather than trying to appeal to a wide swath of voters, Joshua reported.

Datapoint

Harris has one group in particular to thank for boosting her polling numbers: women.

While young Americans and voters of colour are also fuelling her rise, Harris’s campaign is betting that women will propel record turnout on election day [free to read].

She does better among women than Trump or Biden, according to an FT polling analysis. More than 48 per cent of women voters intend to cast their ballots for Harris, compared to 42 per cent for Trump. That number stood at 45.5 for Biden when he ended his bid.

Interestingly, Harris has not mentioned her gender explicitly, nor her potential to make history for Black women. She has, however, called out Trump and Vance for increasingly personal and sexist attacks on her.

“Women have been waiting for eight years for a messenger,” political scientist Lara Brown told the FT’s Lauren Fedor. “Harris has stepped into a place where Democrats and those who are aligned with the Democratic party . . . have been hungry for a voice, and she has given them a voice.”

Joycelen King, 61, a Harris campaign volunteer, said: “I thought that Hillary was going to get in there, but they fooled us”, referring to Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign. “But to have [Harris] be a diverse woman, it just shows how much the United States has changed.”

Viewpoints