Newsweek, August 2024
Vice President Kamala Harris is riding a wave of strong polling and fundraising after becoming the Democratic presidential nominee. Following an energized convention in Chicago last week, Harris is in a much stronger position than Biden prior to his exit. But the race is far from over as Harris and Trump will spend the next few months on the campaign trail trying to win support from undecided voters in swing states.
However, Harris has seemed unwilling to be interviewed in any meaningful way and has not subjected herself to the scrutiny of a tough political interviewer since succeeding Biden as nominee. This may in part be be explained by a desire to avoid making the same disastrous mistake the then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made during her 2016 presidential bid. During a fundraiser in New York on September 10, 2016, Clinton remarked that half of Trump’s supporters belonged in a “basket of deplorables” who did not represent America. The other half, she noted, were simply people who were desperate for change.
