Supporters of Vice President Kamala Harris are said to be disappointed and frustrated that she was not considered as a potential leader of the Democratic ticket following President Joe Biden’s widely criticized debate performance last week. According to Politico, some of Harris’s allies were displeased by the post-debate discussions among party members about a potential replacement for Biden, which included names like Govs. Gavin Newsom of California and Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, but not the Vice President. This rejection occurred despite expectations that Harris would come to her boss’s defense amidst a wave of criticism over his weak performance against a more assertive and confident former President Donald Trump.
Names like Newsom and Whitmer “trended online as potential replacements for Biden on the Democratic ticket, while Harris — by several measures the most obvious and best-positioned candidate — was left to publicly defend Biden at the single worst moment of their four-year-old political partnership,” Politico reported.
Some of Harris’ followers are feeling frustrated by the fact that her name is not being included in discussions about other ambitious Democrats, according to Politico. They are finding themselves unable to take action on this matter, as Harris is currently obligated to support him.
“There’s nothing that she could do externally that would be wise,” Democratic strategist Michael Trujillo told the outlet. “Her best strategy is to internally just be an amazing VP.”
However, as highlighted by Politico, Harris had no intention of attempting to spin Biden’s terrible performance in a positive way:
“She had to perform the role of good soldier almost immediately after the debate, with postmortem interviews having been pre-scheduled with CNN and MSNBC. As Harris watched Biden’s face-plant, she and her team realized her response would be even more closely scrutinized, according to three aides granted anonymity to describe private discussions — and she quickly made clear to her staff that they shouldn’t try to sugarcoat how badly her running mate had performed. Harris told her advisers her role was simple, the aides said: project confidence as quickly and clearly as possible as a leader of the party, while preserving credibility by recognizing how weak the debate had been.”
“She wanted to have an acknowledgment of what everybody was seeing,” a senior aide to Harris told the outlet.
“The president said himself that it was not his best performance,” Harris herself noted after the debate.
