For months I’ve been in contact with a group of senior Republican strategists keeping tabs on Donald Trump and the party’s view of the unfolding Democratic presidential primary. Since the beginning of the campaign, these people have been worried that Biden constituted the biggest political threat to Trump’s reelection. Early public opinion polls certainly lend credibility to their concerns. But a smaller, though equally distinguished group of Republican operatives in my Rolodex, a sort of GOP cult of Kamala, had been insisting for weeks that Harris was being radically underestimated. With her surgical vivisection of Biden in the first debate, it seemed their fears had been realized. Now, as Democrats prepare for a second round of debates next week, these strategists are raising the alarm.

Harris, 54, is California’s junior U.S. senator and former state attorney general. She might have more natural political skill than any of her competitors for the Democratic nomination. She certainly checks more boxes—African American, woman, racially diverse, a legitimate strength in a party occasionally obsessed with identity politics. Harris also is something of a Washington outsider, or could claim to be, at least, having served in Congress for less than three years. Unlike Biden, she has not spent decades on Capitol Hill making tough choices or agreeing to imperfect compromises.

If any of this rings familiar, it’s because it is. The last Democrat to win the presidency, Barack Obama, was all of those things, save for the obvious. That is why some Republicans take it as an article of faith that by the time the Democrats gather in Milwaukee a little less than a year from now to coronate their nominee, Harris will be the guest of honor. Who else could they possibly nominate? some Republicans have told me, convinced. But in dismantling Biden on the big stage in Miami, Harris showcased how she might earn it—and why next week’s debate in Detroit could be decisive.

But some dialed-in Republicans described Harris as a serious threat. “I have long been most concerned about Harris. I think she has an appeal to the Scottsdale soccer mom who is a registered Republican. Between her appeal and Trump’s women problems, she has probably already won those voters,” said an experienced Republican consultant in Arizona, an emerging battleground that sent a Democrat to the U.S. Senate in 2018 for the first time in a generation and is ground zero for suburban discontent with Trump. “But I also think she does better amongst Independents who generally split ideologically in Arizona,” this GOP insider added. “Independents are just sick of everything, and her no-nonsense approach would have appeal broadly, and even to some white Independent and GOP men. She doesn’t have the Biden wimp factor, and that’s probably important in a place like Arizona.”

Imagine what Harris might be able to do against a real villain like Trump, some worried Republican insiders back in Washington were simultaneously telling me via text message. Hillary Clinton, unlikable, clunky, and corrupt, could never do that. “Kamala is a nightmare” for Republicans, one of them told me.

More here--> https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2019/07/gop-insiders-fear-kamala-harris