After years of watching, in sputtering frustration, as Donald Trump gleefully broke and rewrote the rules of American politics, Democrats have finally found a master rule-breaker of their own. We’ve rarely seen anything like Kamala Harris’s sudden launch from a standing start into the political stratosphere: She racked up a record-breaking $200 million in donations in the first week of her campaign — quadruple what President Biden raised in the entire month of April — and inspired a phenomenon in which hundreds of thousands of people have joined hastily organized Zoom calls that last for hours.

In the blink of an eye, Harris has entered the rarified space that most politicians can only dream of: She has become the symbol, figurehead, and beneficiary of a surge that has burst the normal bounds of politics and tapped into the broader culture. Beyoncé donated a stirring, gospel-inflected hit, “Freedom,” as the campaign’s anthem; British pop star Charli XCX set off a wave of memes and TikTok videos by dubbing the vice-president “brat,” a nifty co-branding of Charli’s summer album about women being themselves and having fun.

“Mindy Kaling joined the South Asian call, with George Takei, Zachary Quinto, Raven Symone, Sophia Bush, Ashlyn Harris, Brian Michael Smith, and Justin Tranter attending the LGBTQ call,” according to The Hollywood Reporter. “Katie McGrath, Connie Britton, Pink, and more signed on to the white women’s call, with Pink reportedly joining right after leaving the stage of a performance in Sweden.”

Republicans have acknowledged they were caught off guard. “All of us were hit with a little bit of a political sucker punch,” the GOP vice-presidential candidate, J.D. Vance, admitted to a group of donors at a private meeting. “The bad news is that Kamala Harris does not have the same baggage as Joe........

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