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YIKES: Was This Kamala's Most Awkward Moment Yet?

Guy Benson
Guy Benson  |  September 20, 2024 2:35 PM

Kamala Harris rarely takes questions.  Like, very rarely.  Axios published a story yesterday outlining the Harris-Walz campaign strategy of avoiding scrutiny, interviews and questions -- and quantified how that approach has been playing out.  Since Joe Biden was shoved out of the race by his party in July (Nancy Pelosi bizarrely now claims that Harris won an "open primary" because nobody challenged her), Kamala Harris has done exactly two televised interviews. In two months.  One was national, one was local.  We wrote entire pieces about each because they're so infrequent.  The CNN interview wasn't good for her.  The local Philadelphia sit-down was considerably worse.  She has done one interview with a national print publication, and zero press conferences.    She and her running mate have done a total of six of these interviews, combined, since Biden was ousted.  

By comparison, Donald Trump and JD Vance have done more than 70 interviews and press conferences over that same stretch of time -- not including dozens of interviews Axios excluded because they occurred with conservative-leaning hosts or podcasters (I'd simply note that so many gaffes and self-destructive comments from politicians come in 'friendly' settings).  So in reality, the disparity is even greater than these statistics suggest:


Here is Axios' summary of the strategy:

The Harris-Walz ticket is on pace to do fewer interviews and press conferences than any major party's presidential pairing in modern U.S. history. Vice President Harris' team is betting she and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, can avoid many tough interviews and still win as they run down the clock to Election Day. That strategy comes even as many voters say they want to learn more about Harris — and as her campaign has said she's changed many of her past liberal positions to more centrist policies. The previously press-friendly Walz has joined Harris in largely dodging the media while campaigning before friendly, enthusiastic crowds...Harris' team believes limiting interactions with the press is the right strategy — even if it frustrates reporters, some close to the campaign told Axios...Harris' approach carries risks at a time when polls have shown that many voters still don't know her or her running mate well...Some of Harris' worst moments as vice president have come during interviews when she made flip or unclear comments about key policies. Her campaign is trying to avoid more moments like that.

This line from the article is a perfect encapsulation of the point it's making: "The Harris-Walz campaign declined to make either candidate available for a brief interview."  Of course they did.  We have gotten nothing in the way of an explanation from Harris for any of her many flip-flops.  They just aren't doing the whole 'explanations' thing, generally:


It's essential to point out that all of this ducking and dodging could not be sustainable for them without media complicity and acceptance.  Journalists are demonstrating that they are willing to humiliate themselves and hasten their industry's obsolescence in the name of helping their political team win, so Team Kamala's decision to avoid questions is hard to argue with, politically speaking.  They are getting very little heat for it, and much of the 'news' media are carrying her message anyway, directly rewarding her approach:

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And it's not hard to see why Kamala's handlers want to stick to rehearsed, non-specific, non-extemporaneous responses, while avoiding anything approaching challenging questions.  Consider this summary written by Harris-friendly NBC News about her recent forum with the National Association of Black Journalists:

 Vice President Kamala Harris took questions from a panel of members of the National Association of Black Journalists on Tuesday — with some moments turning tense as she outlined her vision for her administration if she wins the November election...Reporters Tonya Mosley of NPR, Gerren Keith Gaynor of TheGrio and Eugene Daniels of Politico repeatedly pressed Harris for direct answers on other topics, interrupting her multiple times when she veered away from the subject or rambled. She dodged a potentially contentious moment when Mosley stopped her during an answer about gun control by laughing through the moment.  The audience of about 150, including 100 college students, began to signal discomfort when Harris avoided answering a question about whether she would issue an executive order to create a commission to study reparations. Ultimately, she said it would come down to Congress, an answer that seemed to deflate some of the attendees. Some members of the audience also signaled displeasure when she gave an indirect answer about whether she would continue the Biden administration’s approach to the Israel-Hamas war. 

Awkward laughter on a tough subject?  "Avoiding" answers and being so obviously "indirect" that it elicited frustrated murmurs from a generally supportive crowd on multiple occasions?  That sounds like Kamala Harris.  For a sense of how it all felt in the room, look at this excruciating farewell, as the rare Q&A wrapped up:


The applause stops very early.  Amid the silence, Harris rapidly shakes hands with the three journalists, looking less than pleased, then waves to the quiet crowd without looking at them, and makes a beeline for the exit.  Then the three media members just stand there, exchanging uncomfortable glances about what had just transpired: 


Team Kamala's solution?  Fewer Q&A's.  That is embarrassingly acceptable to many of the people whose whole job is doing the Q part of Q&A's.  Will it prove acceptable to voters?