I was all about Team Kamala last election, no surprise there. But, when she lost—or even “lost”—a couple of thoughts flooded my mind. First was shock. Then, dismay. Then I wondered what Biden and Harris would do to stop the steal because it felt weird. Finally, I felt betrayal when they did nothing.

In one of my Tarot for America series, I had a moment when I asked what would happen to Kamala Harris. I (correctly) predicted that she would step back from politics and that she felt “over it,” which ended up being true.

Truth be told, my tarot cards might’ve just been confirming something that I felt all along. Kamala had every reason to quit the Democratic party after her run for president as well as her time as VP.

Kamala would have been a far better president than 47 and while I believe the election was stolen, I do think she made the right call.

While Biden did a ton of good stuff for the average American, the truth is that his presidency (and Kamala’s VP work) highlighted a major issue in America’s democracy. We had high hopes but the political aspect was dashed.

Or rather, it highlighted a major issue among Democratic politicians—an elephant in the room, so to speak.

While Republicans were totally fine overstepping bounds, fighting dirty, and openly breaking laws with a smile, Democrats were terrified of doing anything even remotely off-base. In fact, just filibustering or blocking nominations was treated like a “Constitutional crisis” despite their constituents begging them to do something.

Every single thing the Biden campaign could have done to prevent Trump from taking power was either delayed, stalled, flouted, or ignored. Even when it came to blocking unpopular legislation, Democrats often sided with Republicans at the 11th hour, making every vow they took to the American people a fucking joke.

Many of us leftists saw the writing on the wall. We knew democracy as we know it was under attack. We were hoping that our votes could prevent fascism from happening stateside. What we got was an election that wasn’t even contested despite evidence of a steal in plain sight.

The truth is that there are so many voters out there who were totally let down by the Democrats in power—to the point that they either sat out from the election or just switched to voting for the GOP out of spite.

Kamala and Joe failed to stand up to the GOP’s bullying tactics when we needed them to do it the most. That alone will make it hard for Democrats to gain the trust they need in the future.

Let’s be honest: to a point, she was set to fail. She wasn’t even primaried. There were no ranked-choice options and the Democratic party made the mistake of listening to big money donors over the actual people who would have come out to vote.

People like Nancy Pelosi basically took a crowbar to the shins of the candidates that would have gotten people out to vote—and influences like hers have become more and more apparent over the past year.

Had AOC or Bernie Sanders run, we likely would have gotten the presidency…assuming our ballots weren’t hacked thanks to Elon Musk. But, corporate Dems weren’t ready for that and never will be.

The way right-wingers spoke about her and her family was horrific. The same could be said about Tim Walz. What made it worse was that so many leftists also treated her with the same disrespect and misogyny, to the point that it was actually alarming.

I honestly wouldn’t wish that kind of treatment onto anyone decent. Like, some of the stuff people were saying about her would have traumatized me. Everything she worked for was basically thrown back in her face. Her family was threatened by zealots.

It was ugly and while she made one critical mistake, she didn’t deserve the total ingratitude her own constituents gave her.

I’m saying this on multiple levels. Kamala got burned bad by the presidential race and her fellow Democrats. But let’s get a little more into it.

The Democratic party is complicit in what’s going on right now, whether they like it or not. They laid flat when the GOP trampled over the Constitution, shoved crooked judges in the Supreme Court, and ratfucked everything to shit. They did nothing when they still had the power to do something.

Sorry not sorry, but there’s no way to come back from that kind of failure. People are literally dying and being taken from their homes as a direct result of their refusal to act while they could. It wouldn’t shock me if people swore off voting for her because of that alone.

Right now, we can’t deal with more corporate Dems in office or in running. We need more AOC’s, more Jasmines, and more Mamdanis. And in recent weeks, Harris herself has admitted she has a lot of bones to pick with the system—and that many institutions failed Americans.

In a statement, she said that her service would no longer be in an elected office. She’s apparently also going on a book tour, because of course, she is. That’s what all politicians do these days as a way to pad their wallets.

The Democratic party has made it clear that they’re too chickenshit to enact change in their current state. It wouldn’t shock me if many of the people doing the political machine dance needed to see major names step down and people losing elections to tyrants for them to wake up.

Honestly, if you put yourself in Kamala’s shoes, would you really want to deal with America as-is right now? Really? Because I wouldn’t, especially if I really wanted to see a healthier, more egalitarian, more prosperous America.

For years, half the country (GOP voters) would tear apart the only people trying to clean up the grimy mess left by the fascist party now. And the things they did were vicious, with some even losing their lives to vicious, violent attacks.

The GOP would often get the credit for any good things that the Democrats did. And when the GOP would do something terrible, those same voters would screech and ask why the Democrats they refused to elect didn’t prevent them from doing this.

I wouldn’t be surprised if many left-leaning politicians felt like they were in an abusive relationship with their country—almost like a parent watching a teen self-injure, only to get hit by the teenager whenever they try to save the kid from themselves.

I don’t know anyone who would be willing to deal with that kind of constant battering after losing an election to a child rapist. No amount of money or power would make that worth it.

A major step-down like this is a big, big deal. I mean, this is like seeing the Vice President of Operations of Microsoft fumble a major deal with Google, then throw their hands up in the air and say, “You know what? Fuck this., I’m done with tech.”

Really, think about what that means.

It normally would be enough to send a message to the others on your team. Will it actually make the proverbial break, though? I don’t know. It seems like they’re pretty fine with losing.

Psst…wanna just get a single weekly email instead? Subscribe below!