Harris has championed more progressive ideas than Biden
Although the vice president has been a loyal messenger for President Joe Biden’s platform for the past four years, she has previously advocated for more progressive positions on health care, taxes and other issues and will have to decide whether she’ll return to those roots.
A look at the proposals she floated during her run for the 2020 presidential nomination – in which Biden staked out more moderate ground – and as a senator can give some insights into her potential platform for 2024.
Broadening health insurance coverage
Harris advocated for shifting the US to a government-backed health insurance system but stopped short of wanting to completely eliminate private insurance during her 2020 campaign. The proposal was to the left of the one floated by Biden, who wanted to build on the Affordable Care Act, but not as progressive as Sen. Bernie Sanders’ Medicare-for-All plan, which she co-sponsored while in the Senate. Both of her rivals critiqued her idea, with Biden’s campaign calling it a “have-it-every-which-way approach.”
Harris’ measure called for transitioning to a Medicare-for-All-type system over 10 years but continuing to allow private insurance companies to offer Medicare plans.
Also, the proposal would not have raised taxes on the middle class to pay for the coverage expansion, in another contrast with Sanders’ plan. Instead, it would raise the needed funds by taxing Wall Street trades and transactions and changing the taxation of offshore corporate income.
The Biden administration, along with congressional Democrats, broadened access to health insurance by temporarily beefing up the federal premium subsidies for Affordable Care Act policies. That helped drive the uninsured rate to record lows during his term.
But the enhanced subsidies are set to expire at the end of 2025, so the next president and Congress will have to decide how to handle an extension, which could cost about $335 billion over a decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
Defending abortion rights
Harris took on the lead role of championing abortion rights for the administration after Roe v. Wade was overturned in June 2022. In January, she started a “reproductive freedoms tour” to multiple states, including a stop in Minnesota thought to be the first by a sitting US president or vice president at an abortion clinic.
On abortion access too, Harris embraced more progressive policies than Biden in the 2020 campaign, as a candidate criticizing his previous support for the Hyde Amendment, a measure that blocks federal funds from being used for most abortions.
Policy experts suggested that although Harris’ current policies on abortion and reproductive rights may not differ significantly from Biden’s, as a result of her national tour and her own focus on maternal health, she may be a stronger messenger.
“One of the roles of the White House in abortion policy is the power of the bully pulpit,” said Kelly Baden, vice president of public policy for the Guttmacher Institute, a research and policy organization focused on sexual and reproductive health that supports abortion rights. “So to have somebody who feels comfortable and really values-aligned with a strong message about abortion justice, that is potentially a shift in what we would see with a Harris administration versus a Biden administration.”
Baden also said Harris’ conversations with abortion patients and providers, as well as state legislators and others, through her tour this year give her “a deeper well from which to draw when it comes to what is needed on abortion policy in the world now.” And, she concluded, Harris may place the issue higher on her list of priorities.
Providing middle class tax relief
As a senator, Harris proposed providing middle-class and working families with a refundable tax credit of up to $6,000 a year (per couple) to help keep up with living expenses. The measure would have cost an estimated $3 trillion over 10 years.
Unlike a typical tax credit, the bill would allow taxpayers to receive the benefit – up to $500 – on a monthly basis so families don’t have to turn to payday loans with very high interest rates.
Harris also campaigned on the measure – titled the LIFT the Middle Class Act, or Livable Incomes for Families Today – during her earlier presidential run.
Many American families are now struggling to afford the even higher costs of living after a spell of steep inflation earlier this decade pushed up prices, which remain elevated. They generally give the Biden administration poor marks for its handling of the economy, which campaign officials have had trouble changing despite repeated efforts to show how the president has tried to lower costs and help everyday people.
One popular measure – an expanded child tax credit that gave certain families up to $3,600 per child that was partially available in monthly payments – was only in effect in 2021.
As a presidential candidate, Harris also proposed raising the corporate income tax rate to 35%, where it was before the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act that Trump and congressional Republicans pushed through Congress reduced the rate to 21%. Biden has floated increasing the rate to 28%.
Although Harris will probably pursue similar policies on raising taxes on the wealthy and corporations to provide relief for middle-class and working Americans, she may alter them somewhat.
“I would expect Harris to put her own stamp on these ideas much like she proposed in her 2019 ‘LIFT the Middle Class Act,’” John Gimigliano, a principal at KPMG’s Washington National Tax practice, said in a statement, adding that an important factor will be whom Harris chooses as Treasury secretary, should she win the election.
Lowering drug prices
Harris has had many ideas on how to reduce drug costs, a main health care headache for Americans and a popular talking point for many presidential candidates, including Biden and Trump.
Titled People over Profit, Harris’ plan had similar provisions to legislation rolled out by Sanders, and some of the concepts made it into the Inflation Reduction Act that Democrats pushed through Congress in 2022, such as penalizing drugmakers that raise their prices faster than inflation.
Like Trump, Harris proposed allowing the federal government to set “a fair price” for any drug sold at a cheaper price in any economically comparable country, including Canada, the United Kingdom, France, Japan or Australia. If manufacturers were found to be price gouging, the government could import their drugs from abroad or, in egregious cases, use its existing but never-used “march-in” authority to license a drug company’s patent to a rival that would produce the medication at a lower cost.
As California’s attorney general, Harris joined other states in pursuing several drugmakers for their pricing or practices, winning multimillion-dollar settlements.
Boosting affordable housing
As a senator, Harris introduced the Rent Relief Act, which would establish a refundable tax credit for renters who annually spend more than 30% of their gross income on rent and utilities. The amount of the credit would range from 25% to 100% of the excess rent, depending on the renter’s income.
Harris called housing a human right and said in a 2019 news release on the bill that every American deserves to have basic security and dignity in their own home.
The Biden administration has been increasingly focused on helping people with high housing costs. Earlier this month, Biden released a series of proposals that included pulling tax credits from landlords who raise rent by more than 5% per year and having federal agencies assess whether to use surplus federally owned land to build affordable housing. Earlier in the year, he proposed a mortgage relief credit that would provide $5,000 per year for two years for middle-class first-time homebuyers.
The vice president's advocacy for a government-backed health insurance system during her 2020 presidential campaign was more progressive than President Biden's stance, but less radical than Sen. Bernie Sanders' Medicare-for-All plan.
In her role advocating for abortion rights, Vice President Harris started a "reproductive freedoms tour" and visited an abortion clinic, a first for a sitting US vice president or president.
