Why Kamala Harris is skipping the Al Smith dinner

By Phil Lawler ( bio - articles - email ) | Sep 24, 2024

Why did Kamala Harris decline an invitation to speak at the Al Smith dinner?

The reason given by her campaign staff—that she needs to spend the time campaigning in the key “battleground” states—can be quickly dismissed as unconvincing. The most remarkable characteristic of the Harris campaign has been the candidate’s reluctance to appear on the campaign trail, except in carefully scripted events. At first glance the Al Smith dinner might look like an ideal opportunity in that respect; there would be no tough questions, only a lighthearted speech, which speechwriters could prepare in advance.

But take a closer look. If she were to appear at table alongside the cardinal-archbishop of New York, swapping jokes, no reporter could fail to comment on the incongruity of the situation. When political pundits look at Cardinal Dolan—or at the Catholic Church in general—they immediately think of opposition to abortion. Vice President Harris is, of course, a zealous proponent of unrestricted abortion on demand. Yet any mention of their differences on that topic would ruin the congenial atmosphere of the dinner. Her most avid supporters would be disappointed if Harris failed to confront the cardinal; yet she would offend against civility, and lose the sympathy of many Catholic Democrats, if she did.

For that matter, Harris would have trouble poking fun at her rival, “roasting” him in the usual spirit of the dinner. If Donald Trump is the greatest threat to American democracy since the Civil War, as President Biden has charged, it would be unseemly to make jokes about his hair color or his hand gestures or his golf game. Again, the most partisan Democrats would be disappointed if Harris missed another opportunity to demonize her opponent; but undecided voters would be alienated if she ruined the mood of a pleasant occasion. She couldn’t win.

And what will Harris lose by skipping the Al Smith dinner? The conventional wisdom is that she will miss a chance to court the Catholic vote. But Vice President Harris and her campaign consultants know better. They know there is no “Catholic vote.”

There are Catholic voters, obviously, making up roughly one-fourth of the American electorate. They represent a key segment of the voting public, and polls show that they are more or less evenly divided in their political sympathies. A closer look at the poll results suggests that they are also divided on which political issues they consider most important.

The US Catholic bishops (most of them, anyway) have been saying for decades that abortion should be the paramount issue in voters’ minds. But politicians and their consultants count votes, and they have learned over the years that the bishops’ public statements do not swing elections.

Among serious Catholics—those who attend Mass and receive the sacraments regularly—the abortion issue is indeed decisive. But the Harris campaign recognizes that she cannot appeal to those voters. She will not lose standing with pious Catholics by failing to show up at a charity dinner in New York. She has already lost them by her enthusiasm for the slaughter of the unborn, by her support for an administration that jails pro-life activists, for her questions about whether a believing Catholic could be qualified to serve as a judge. If there really were an organized “Catholic vote,” Kamala Harris would have lost it long ago.

But many Catholic voters who identify themselves as Catholics are not swayed by their bishops’ statements. They evidently believe that they should decide moral issues for themselves, disregarding any inconvenient teachings of their Church. Their unwillingness to take violations of human dignity seriously has been strengthened over time: by the example of prominent politicians (Biden, Pelosi, etc.) who flout Church teaching with seeming impunity, by the prelates and politicians who hide the abortion issue beneath a capacious “seamless garment.”

And now, after the latest shocking public statement by Pope Francis, anyone who believes that the Catholic Church teaches with moral authority must wrestle with the Pontiff’s claim that all religions are paths to God. If the Church—and the Church alone—is not guided by the Holy Spirit, then there is no convincing reason for the faithful to regard Church teaching as decisive, no reason to expect Catholics to think alike, no basis for a ‘Catholic vote.’