CHICAGO — Hang out long enough at a Democratic event these days and someone will say it: “It feels like 2008.”
The packed arenas, the bonkers fundraising, early reports of voter registration spikes, the hundreds of thousands of new volunteers who’ve stepped forward — and all of it in just the five weeks since Vice President Kamala Harris moved to the top of the ticket — have had Democrats betting they’ve captured the magic of 2008. It was a transformative year in Democratic politics, setting Barack Obama on a path to become the first Black president. He won decisively, taking 365 electoral votes.
In interviews with party officials, volunteers and campaign officials, common themes emerged that they say make today reminiscent of 2008. Phone calls are streaming into their offices with voters proactively wanting to help, many from people who haven’t volunteered before. Younger voters are engaging. Small-dollar donations are pouring in, a third of which in the last week were from first-time donors. And large-dollar donors who hadn’t given to the party in years are getting off the sidelines.
Gillian Rosenberg Armour, who was Obama’s 2008 deputy political director for the Iowa caucuses, said the lack of a divisive primary campaign that could have splintered the party and an intense desire to defeat Donald Trump set this year apart. She said she sees trend lines that point to the same level of voter engagement and argued that Harris stands to unite more coalitions — including Black, Asian and female voters — than even Obama did.
“Women are really angry and intensely aware of the stakes in this election,” Rosenberg Armour said. “Electing a woman president is the strongest rejection of the anti-choice, MAGA, GOP agenda.”
Just hours before Harris accepted her historic nomination last week, Black women who serve as state Democratic Party chairs gathered in Chicago's West Loop to celebrate their place in the party, and afterward, several noted how empowering and motivating Harris’ candidacy was to them. Harris hasn’t made gender or race a centerpiece of her campaign, but many Democrats say they look to her as a motivating force.
“It’s like 2008, but different,” said Lavora Barnes, chair of the Michigan Democratic Party. “People were fired up for Barack Obama in a way we hadn’t seen before. But with Kamala Harris and Tim Walz, there’s this deep understanding of ... we have to get it done, which is so important. We can’t let Trump in the White House. And then these two people who bring joy and love and care for the country to this and do it with such enthusiasm and excitement themselves, it’s lifted it even higher, I feel, than where we were in 2008. It’s remarkable how good it feels.”
Ann-Marie Herod, who attended the Black women leaders event, said Harris’ candidacy is inspiring Black women in particular to take part in the election. Herod recalled Fannie Lou Hamer, the 1960s civil rights activist whose integrated delegation from Mississippi was denied seats at the 1964 Democratic convention.
“I think about the legacy we’re honoring and how far Black women have come,” Herod said. “It is an amazing feeling.”
Harris took the reins of the party after President Joe Biden made the remarkable move on July 21 to step aside from seeking the nomination. Initially, some Democrats feared the change could trigger divisions and even mayhem within the party. Instead, the party coalesced behind her, and the revamped presidential campaign is seeing sky-high levels of support. Polling almost immediately improved, as did optimism over an expanded electoral map.
But there are unprecedented aspects of Harris' candidacy, including a truncated timeline that could mean she either powers through tough moments or is derailed by them. While she's trying to run as a change candidate, she has been part of the administration for the last 3½ years. The sharp political division in the U.S. wasn't as pronounced in 2008 as it is today. And many in the Democratic Party say they're unified in trying to stop Trump from returning to office.
“It’s very similar energy,” the Rev. Al Sharpton, the civil rights leader and MSNBC host, said of 2008. “But I think what is different, it’s at a much more divisive time because of Trump. The country is much more divided, and there’s more visceral reaction to race and women. I think it’s a momentum that appears to be the same, but it’s against an even more turbulent time.”
A onetime senior aide to Obama involved in Harris’ election efforts had a slightly different take, saying, "I think we’ve surpassed 2008 enthusiasm."
Part of the feeling stems from the marked shift that happened once Biden stepped aside. Biden struggled to speak without a teleprompter — and sometimes with it. When he did hold events, he typically booked small venues.
Things have changed. On Aug. 20, for instance, the night the United Center was packed with 20,000 people, 18,000 more Democrats spilled into the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee for a rally with Harris and Walz. By the end of the rally, supporters had signed up for 2,800 volunteer shifts, according to the campaign. Similar crowds showed up in Arizona and Michigan.
“It feels like 2008, and there’s numbers to go with it,” Pete Giangreco, who worked on both of Obama’s campaigns, said of the massive fundraising and the fact that the Democratic convention drew higher viewership than the Republican convention. Giangreco, who is also strategist to North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, said a high percentage of volunteers who stepped forward in North Carolina had “never volunteered in their lives, and that sounds a lot like 2008.”
He warned, though, that it remained to be seen whether Harris sustains the enthusiasm and whether she can expand her support.
“You don’t win the presidency and the Electoral College by only firing up your base,” Giangreco said.
Even Michelle Obama opened her remarks at the Democratic convention by nodding to an electric moment in the party.
“Something wonderfully magical is in the air, isn’t it? You know, we’re feeling it here in this arena, but it’s spreading all across this country we love,” she said. “A familiar feeling that’s been buried too deep for far too long. You know what I’m talking about. It’s the contagious power of hope.”
Chris Korge, the chair of the Harris-Walz Victory Fund, who was a top fundraiser for Barack Obama in 2008, said that so far, the pace of fundraising remained intense in the days after the convention and that he was seeing donations from large donors who hadn't written checks since at least 2020.
“I personally think, from a fundraising point of view, there’s no comparison. The energy behind her, fundraising-wise, far outpaces Obama,” Korge said. He said that if the pace of donations keeps up, Harris could be on track to raise $1 billion by November — just since she entered in July.
Still, even as Harris packs venues, she hasn’t drawn the massive audiences Obama got in 2008, when crowds of 100,000 or more showed up in places like St. Louis, Virginia and Denver. And she has yet to answer questions directly from voters, participate in town halls or face Trump on the debate stage in a side-by-side comparison. She is to take part in her first sit-down interview Thursday with CNN.
Jim Messina, who managed Obama’s second campaign for president, pointed to the $500 million in fundraising and the crowds filtering into the Milwaukee arena hours before Harris was to appear as real grassroots support.
“Those are gauges of enthusiasm,” Messina said. “The question is does that get to the next level and really become a movement. And we’re not there yet.”
Johanna Maska, the director of press advance in Obama’s 2008 campaign, said that while it has been energizing for the party to have a leader with a new, fresh face, it remains to be seen whether the enthusiasm is more than an inch deep. Obama was able to translate his celebrity in 2008 into a formidable political operation, she said. Harris needs to prove she can do the same.
“There was a lot more time for President Obama’s romance to build within the Democratic Party. Harris is going to need to keep this infatuation, this newfound love, going for 10-plus weeks,” Maska said. “And I think there’s a difference there, because this love [for Harris] has been so quick that I just hope that it’s not fragile and easily breakable.”
Maska also said building his brand over time meant Obama could withstand punches when they came.
“By the time we got to the general election in 2008, we had been so tested,” she said. “We had primaries in every state. We had such good data on every voter. And we had the ground game to win in Indiana and Iowa. Too many people are comparing Harris’ campaign [to Obama’s] and not realizing the infrastructure and architecture of those campaigns are very different.”
