Can any US candidate offer us hope?
Sharmin Islam
Chappell Roan’s recent refusal to endorse Kamala Harris as the next US President has left liberal Democratic supporters disappointed in the singer’s political choices. Last month, the singer declined an invitation to perform at the White House, in acknowledgement of the US government’s complicity with Israel’s genocide in Gaza.
Despite Chappell Roan’s informed decision making, many fans declared that Roan’s dismissal of Kamala Harris equated to supporting Trump’s battle for US presidency. The public disappointment and outrage that Roan was met with online led to the star’s creation of another TikTok video, reassuring her fans that whilst she is critical of the Democratic party, she will be voting for Harris.
Roan’s decision to post an explanatory video after the backlash falls in line with the rhetoric that cancel culture is harming celebrities, who are performing for fickle audiences that are difficult to please. My own disappointment seeped in after I had watched Roan’s follow up videos in which she announces her vote for Kamala Harris, albeit with hesitancy. I would have preferred to think that Roan had a politics of abstention, not only refusing to endorse a Presidential election, but rejecting the practice of voting to choose the future figurehead of US imperialism.
Harris is the Presidential candidate who is not Trump, the “top cop” who is considered the lesser of two evils and a beacon of progressivism for those who hail Western liberal democracy. But how good is the icing on a cake if the cake is mouldy? As Joshua Briond discusses in his recent article, the United States is sustained by racialised violence, colonialism and genocidal terror.
Instead, we need to analyse what constitutes Western liberal democracy before we think about who to elect for President. On the level of superficial electoral politics however, the organisation of Western liberal democracy in the US is perceived to be defined by two contesting parties, the Democrats and the Republicans. Often shoehorned into “left-wing” and “right-wing”, the two parties have been less about opposing positions on domestic and foreign policy and more so about differing strategies on how to engage the US public.
Under Barack Obama’s term, it was easy for liberals to sanitise the death of Syrian civilians by the leader because of the history which was made in electing the first Black President of the United States. The Biden administration has explicitly supported the Israeli assault with arms sales from the US now being used to terrorise civilians in Lebanon. Under the current Democratic government, it has almost been a year since Israel amplified its genocidal ethnic cleansing of Palestine. Under the Biden administration students have been criminalised for encampments supporting anti-colonialism in Palestine and anti-Zionism has been wrongly conflated with anti-Semitism.
When these active political policies are expressed as justifications as to why one should not vote for either party, Americans are often criticised for endorsing fascism, despite the fact that liberal democracy, as Joshua Briond argues, is the breeding ground from which fascism germinates. In other words, if imperialism and colonial violence in the Global South induced by the US is not already a fascistic nightmare, specifically the atrocities being propagated in support of Israel, then voting for the Democrats might not necessarily be a morally righteous choice. As Associate Professor of African American studies Charisse Burden-Stelly reiterates in an interview with Briahna Joy Gray, voting for Harris has often been a dishonest endeavour, with many citing ethical purity rather than fear of Trump as their explanation for voting.
Chappell Roan’s fans have also claimed that Kamala Harris and the Democratic party are the party which supports queer rights. The liberal co-optation of identity politics has rapidly trickled into electoral politics. Obama’s presidency as the First Black leader of the “free world” hails fame and history, however Obama’s policies followed from the white presidents which preceded him. Thus, Barack Obama was merely the first Black Leader to implement the next series of warfare and colonial destruction for the maintenance of White Supremacy. It is within this context that Kamala Harris, as the first Black Indian woman president, and any presidential candidate (whatever their identity may be) place themselves in. Kamala’s identity as a woman of colour does not change the duties which US Presidents perform to maintain the nation’s position as the global oppressor. In fact, identity markers have been utilised by liberals to enforce an ‘objectively’ correct and moral choice; the same liberals would not consider the label “top cop” as a reason not to vote.
In her recent tour of electoral campaigning, Kamala has been praised for silencing a protestor against genocide, from which she replied “I’m speaking”. I praise the protestor who brings light to the corrupt ground that the US prospers from as a Global leader. Who is Kamala Harris speaking for? It is not just from history that we have learned, there is no such thing as a good US president.
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