The story of Kamala Harris’ political career can, in part, be told through videotape. Ms. Harris has risen to public attention – and more importantly, risen to the attention of Joseph R. Biden Jr., who grabbed her as his running mate on Tuesday – because of a series of often dramatic moments during congressional hearings, town halls and primary debates. Here are five of them, with our comments.
“That little girl was me”
Adam: This was in many ways the pivotal moment of Mrs. Harris’ presidential campaign – “that little girl was me” – and it shows why Mike Pence is probably worried about her face in a vice-presidential debate. She is incredibly sharp and piercing. Her challenge to Joe Biden over his opposition to busing during June 27, 2019, primary debate shows her training as a lawyer. It’s one of those attacks that you do not see coming until it’s too late (though I’m not sure there were many. Biden could have done in response. He was, as you probably remember, wrestling). What I found striking here is that even though we may assume it was a prepared attack, it does not feel found, as so many debate lines do. (Go and Google “Klobuchar-Debate-Jokes.”)
Shane: It did not, and that has been one of Mrs Harris’s great strengths at the debate stage, in Congress and even in delivering speeches: sounded authentic and of the moment, even when her remarks were deeply prepared. Prosecutors, in fact, make their arguments careful and memorable. The reason is that she is often less powerful and formidable off-the-cuff.
Adam: You make a good point about their training in Congress. You could see that. She does not disappear in the mind-numbing Congress speech, does she? (Please say.)
Shane: Yes – I mean, people forget, with the speed of news cycles these days, but she has not been in DC that long! Her opening line in the debate sequence was simply devastating. One of the more cut “but” in the English language is the one that comes after “I do not believe you are a racist.”
Adam: And the split-screen did not help; everyone saw Mr. Bid on. But I have a question for you: If it showed her as such a good debater, why did her campaign collapse? Has she found it as indecent as to look at the calculating politician for regular people who do not appeal from debates?
Shane: Oh, go for the simple questions, Adam.
Adam: Hey, that’s my reward for going first! Record it with the editors.
Shane: The shortest version is that for all the peaks they generate – their big announcement rally, the moment of debate – Mrs Harris did not find a sustainable job in a primary where Mr. Biden occupied the political center and Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren locked up the left. Oh, her campaign was tainted by intense fighting and she ran out of cash. Also: She dropped out early, when she could hang out with her longer. Her vice presidency selection shows why: Glad to go out gave her a hug that would not have stumbled out of Iowa in fourth place.
Adam: As the challenge from Mrs. Harris to Mr. Praying about school buses was a highlight in her campaign, could these moments of 2019, in Mrs Harris’ opinion on health care policy, have been a low point?
Shane: Hmm, I do not think these were just a low point. But I think she revealed one of the biggest shortcomings of her candidacy: It was not clear where she stood on health care, one of the most fundamental problems of the cycle. And interestingly, her campaign had to do some cleaning up after both of these moments – reducing her suggestion that you could just get rid of private insurance in January and then, in June, saying she had mishandled the question during the debate.
Adam: I think we’ll be seeing the raise-your-hand clip for the next three months or so. As you may have noticed, she said she missed the question, and thought she was asked if she would give up her private insurance. I’m not sure anyone else on stage heard it that way, but that’s true: Her initial tentativeness has a “no, you go first” feeling, which can play into criticism of her being cautious and holding her finger in the wind. And it certainly plays into the attempt by the Trump camp to portray her as a liberal.
Shane: Well, here’s the irony: I think this exchange, and the fact that she later traced back to it, shows how she was not, in fact, strictly liberal on this issue. Still, if Democrats have recaptured the Biden debate moment and dreamed about their filleting Mr. Pence, the Trump campaign should be just as happy with the Tapper clip. It already uses it as a cudgel to convey her message of Ms. To hammer Harris as radical.
Adam: Exactly. Next!
“Yes or no please, sir.”
Shane: This was another copy of Ms. Harris flashing her prose experience: She stumbled across Attorney General William Barr, who testified before the House Judiciary Committee in May 2019, of the most pressing question. It was formulated very specifically to be very broad: ‘Has the president as someone at the White House ever asked as suggested that you open an investigation of anyone? ‘ In other words, someone had ever researched a study for someone. Mr. Barr sprayed and stopped. “It looks like you might remember something like that,” she followed with the dagger.
Adam: This was better than Perry Mason. I mean the new one.
Shane: So why is she the vice presidential candidate instead of the presidential one? I do not think there is an equivalent clip of Joe Biden in 2019.
Adam: Or in every year. That goes back to our previous discussions. She has had good candidates – and not so good moments – as a candidate. When she’s in her comfort zone, confronting the prosecutor with a stubborn witness, she’s very powerful. When she’s at a debate stage, talking about health care as an issue that the party is confused about, maybe not so much (and in that, she’s like many first candidates for presidencies). But whatever your policy, this exchange – ‘Yes or no please, sir”- is pretty arrestable television.
Shane: This was not a one-time thing with a sitting attorney general. Back at the beginning of the Trump administration, she questioned Jeff Sessions so forcefully that he interrupted and said, “It makes me nervous.”
Adam: I bet even President Trump applauded Harris-Sessions exchanging.
Tussling with Tulsi Gabbard
Shane: Representative Tulsi Gabbard had made it clear prior to this debate in July 2019 that she intended to attack Ms Harris, but the laundry list of accusations she had unleashed was still shrinking – everything from prison work to marijuana to the death penalty. And Mrs. Harris did not respond in principle to the details. What impact did that have?
Adam: Ms. Gabbard addressed many of the criminal justice issues that have plagued many on the left flank of the party over the California senator. Their answers did – well, not quite ready for prime time. In all likelihood, her answers would have been sharper if she had stayed in the race. But seeing the reaction so far on her selection, it does not seem to have bothered her. I guess this is not an attack that the former governor of Indiana will tend to use in the vice presidency debate.
Shane: You never know! The Trump campaign has tried to attack Mr Biden both for locking people of color with the 1994 crime law, and for supporting police now (which Mr Biden does not).
Adam: So, this is a bit of a head-scratcher. For nearly seven minutes – including the time they stopped the clock due to protests in public and points of order from panel members – Ms. Harris Brett Kavanaugh appeared before his U.S. president of the Supreme Court in September 2018, about whether he had ever spoken to anyone at the law firm set up by President Trump’s personal lawyer about the Robert Mueller case. ‘Be sure of your answer, sir,’ she said, when Mr Kavanaugh looked embarrassed. ‘I ask you a very direct question. Yes or no. ”
Shane: It was very dramatic.
Adam: Although ultimately undecided. Mr Kavanaugh never answered the question, saying he did not know everyone at the law firm, so he could not say. From the sight it was certain that Mrs. Harris had something in mind. (You know that saying about lawyers, exactly: Never ask a witness a question you do not know the answer to.) But if she had someone in front of her eyes, she never mentioned the name at the hearing. Did it ever come out? Was there one?
Shane: The short version is no. Mr. Kavanaugh would later say he did not speak to anyone at the company. Ms Harris would tell reporters, “I have good reason to believe there was a conversation.”
The loudest rumors about her Kavanaugh grill came from Republicans accusing him of smearing him with innuendo. But now Mr Kavanaugh is on the Supreme Court and Mrs Harris is the Democratic nominee for Vice President.
