CNN’s Softball Interview of Kamala Harris
Jarrett Stepman /
Vice President Kamala Harris’ very first interview of her campaign aired on CNN Thursday night.
We waited a month and a half for this and Harris’ much anticipated debut ended up containing barely more substance than the policy section of her website. (Don’t search too long for that section; it doesn’t exist.)
The interview began with a glowing montage resembling a movie trailer, settled in with a few tough questions, and ended with a whole lot of meaningless fluff. There were a few word salads mixed in for flavor.
CNN anchor Dana Bash did press Harris on a handful of her long list of flip flops.
She asked Harris why she changed her policy on fracking. In 2019, Harris said that she was in favor of banning fracking. Here she is saying so.
Now she says she no longer backs the ban on fracking. What changed?
Harris couldn’t articulate a particular reason. She said that climate change is real and that the current administration is doing a good job of hitting climate goals, so she won’t do it.
“What I have seen is that we can grow and we can increase a thriving clean energy economy without banning fracking,” she said.
The vice president was also asked about the record illegal border crossings since she and President Joe Biden ascended to the White House. Bash noted that she was tasked with solving the “root causes” of illegal immigration from Central America.
This is when Harris was the border czar, a phrase the media has desperately attempted to erase from history.
Harris answered that what she did to address the root causes of illegal immigration has “resulted in a number of benefits, including historic investments by American businesses in that region. The number of immigrants coming from that region has actually reduced since we’ve began that work.”
She then said it was actually former President Donald Trump who was against border security and that she and Biden were all for the Senate border bill that failed to pass in February.
That bill would have done little to stop the flow of illegal immigration and was largely stuffed with funding for the war in Ukraine to boot.
Bash later followed up with a softball question—asked in the form of a wink, wink answer—about how voters should respond to her shifting sands policy positions.
“How should voters look at some of the changes you’ve made that you explained some of here in your policy?” Bash asked before giving Harris multiple-choice options to respond with. “Because you’ve had more experience now and you have learned more about the information? Is it running for president in a Democratic primary? And should they feel comfortable and confident that what you say now is going to be your policy moving forward?”
Harris fumbled her response anyway with a meandering non-answer but insisted that her values have stayed the same. Take a listen.
Ah, so we’re supposed to believe that while Harris’ policy positions have largely changed in just a few years, her principles remain timeless. But are those values left-wing, moderate, populist, or what? She didn’t explain.
Those were the high points of the interview. There’s little else to say about the policy substance. I suggest you read my colleague Virginia Allen’s fact check of the handful of substantial questions Harris was asked.
Harris notably brought her dad, I mean her running mate Gov. Tim Walz, D-Minn., along with her. He didn’t do much and just kind of sat there like a chaperone.
Walz was asked a question about his alleged stolen valor and why he made false statements about being a war veteran.
“You said that you carried weapons in war, but you have never deployed actually in a war zone. A campaign official said that you misspoke. Did you?” Bash asked.
The Minnesota governor didn’t really answer. Walz just said that he’s proud of his service, and that he has poor grammar.
After that there really isn’t much to tell in this edited, 27-minute performance.
Harris was asked about the day Biden dropped out of the race which gave her the chance to tell a whimsical story about puzzles and making bacon when she got the phone call. Walz and Harris were questioned about what enchanted them about the DNC. And Harris was given a moment to talk about a picture of her niece watching her accept the nomination.
These are clearly the issues voters care about.
What we learned from this is that the Harris campaign clearly intends to test the outer limits of how much the media and this regime can simply manufacture a presidency.
Harris’ performance Thursday night wasn’t awful. It was just flat and shallow. She gave cookie cutter, not particularly clarifying. answers to serious questions about governing philosophy.
And it’s hard to say that the American people learned much at all other than that Harris held some policies, then she didn’t, she thinks Biden is a great and wonderful president, but she’s new and fresh.
The question Harris was never really asked and generally didn’t answer was this: Why should she be the president? What does she think she will bring to the White House that would make her an effective commander-in-chief? Why should we think she will be anything more than a lifeless caretaker president like her predecessor?
Harris may be more lucid than Biden at this point, but mere lucidity shouldn’t be the only qualification to be president.
The closest Harris got to answering this question of why she should be president is when she said in her talk about her niece, “I am running because I believe that I am the best person to do this job at this moment for all Americans.”
That’s not a bad answer for someone running to be class president, but doesn’t really explain to the American people why a candidate who simply got dropped into this race at the last second should become the leader of the free world.
CNN asked a handful of tough questions, but failed to follow up, and left the American people without answers about what Harris actually stands for.