Who will replace Harris in Senate? ‘Rising’ discusses

Journalist Zaid Jilani on Monday discussed the debate over who should replace Vice President-elect Kamala Harris in the Senate, saying different groups are making pitches based on their demographic characteristics. 

Jilani told Hill.TV’s “Rising” that different factions are pushing California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) to appoint either a Latino senator, a Black senator or an LGBTQ senator. He said each group “has specific people in mind,” who he says are “largely, well-connected political insiders,” like California Secretary of State Alex Padilla. 

“It’s increasingly a feature of kind of liberal politics to organize yourself around these things because it sort of subsumes any ideological debate,” Jilani said, arguing that “general voters don’t care” about appointing candidates of specific demographic backgrounds.

He also pointed to President-elect Joe Biden’s announcement of an all-female White House communications staff. 

“It’s just sort of pointing to something that’s not super-relevant, but using it as a sort of political marker or milestone, which, to me, distracts from the substance of the matter,” he said.

“I don’t think anybody is just a woman, just a Latino, just an African American, right?” he added. “Those are just broad social categories.”