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Cardinal Dolan Addresses Harris' Decision on Al Smith Dinner With Reminder of Last Candidate to Skip It

Rebecca Downs
Rebecca Downs  |  September 24, 2024 5:30 PM

It's been a few days of updates on the Al Smith dinner, an annual Catholic Charities event that is taking place this year on October 17 in New York City. While Vice President Kamala Harris will not attend, former and potentially future President Donald Trump announced on Monday that he will be there. Timothy Cardinal Dolan, the Archbishop of New York who hosts the event and sits in between the two nominees at such dinners, is also weighing in on Harris' move.

The Trump War Room was all too happy to share a clip from Fox News of Dolan addressing such a snub from the Democratic nominee.

"We're disappointed," Cardinal Dolan said at an event in Yonkers on Monday. "We were looking forward to, uh, giving the vice president an enthusiastic welcome, and we kind of, we were confident that she would find this, you know she speaks very much about the high ideals and how it's good to get away from division, come together in unity and all, that's what the Al Smith dinner is all about." 

Dolan also shared "we haven't given up yet," adding "we're not used to this, we don't know how to handle it." 

That's when the reminder of what happened to the last nominee to turn down such a dinner, also the Democratic nominee, Walter Mondale, who was running against President Ronald Reagan in 1984. "This hasn't happened in 40 years since Walter Mondale turned down the invitation, and remember he lost 49 out of 50 states," Dolan reminded, though he also made clear "I don't want to say there's a direct connection there," as attendees at his event could be heard laughing.

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"We're not used to this and we're not giving up," Dolan again emphasized, as he also spoke of support from Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Gov. Kathy Hochul (D-NY), noting "they're both working hard to see that they convince her to come."

When answering a question as to "so there's still a chance," Dolan affirmed that there was and shared an interesting point about what Schumer told him: "he said 'I don't think she made the decision,'" as he then also talked about her schedule and her handlers.

"So, we're not giving up, we hope she's here," Dolan stressed once more before the Fox News clip ended.

In announcing that he would attend, Trump took the opportunity to remind people of Harris' views and actions against Catholics. That's still an issue, to be sure, but Dolan's remarks also raise other concerns when it comes to the control Harris' campaign has over her. 

Harris prefers to campaign in battleground states rather than attend such a dinner. As we addressed with Monday's piece when covering Trump's announcement, if her campaign is supposedly doing so well, why not attend the dinner? While Harris may be ahead at the national level, Trump has a slight edge in the swing states overall, and it's of course possible he once again outperforms the polls. 

Perhaps Harris is not only concerned about her chances in this election, but also the response she'll receive at a Catholic event, despite Dolan's reassurances about "an enthusiastic welcome." 

Dolan was also right to bring up how Harris likes to talk a big talk about "get[ting] away from division" and about "unity." Though he did a fitting job of not trying to go after the Democratic nominee, and to himself sound like a unifying figure, that she is skipping out an such event after offering such platitudes to the American people does make Harris look like a hypocrite.

According to data shared by Pew Research earlier this month, Trump and Harris are tied at 49 percent with overall voters, but by 52-47 percent, Catholics prefer Trump over Harris. By 61-38 percent, white Catholics also prefer Trump to Harris. 

Larry also played Dolan's response during the Tuesday episode of his show as well. In touching upon how Harris is "history-making," Larry reminded that this also applies to skipping the Al Smith dinner, with Harris being the first to do so since Mondale. Harris also isn't just snubbing Dolan, as Larry brought up, but has decided "to snub Catholic Charities, to snub the Catholic Church, and to snub Catholics all around the world."

Not only is it "a very formal affair," Larry offered, but it's also "to show everyone in our nation and around the world that despite how tough this election has been, and despite all of the nasty things that have been said back and forth between the two candidates, there's some things that are bigger and more important in this country... it sends the message to everyone in this country that we're all Americans, we're all human beings, and we don't have to take all of this so seriously that if we lose the election that, you know, this person is my bitter enemy."

Again, it's a display of unity, one Harris is passing up on despite all of her platitudes about "unity," which seem less and less believable by the day. 

In explaining the history of the Al Smith dinner, with the first Catholic nominee for president losing to what Larry offered was "rampant anti-Catholic bigotry in this country," he offered "there still is [that bigotry] I think, personified by Kamala Harris and her Democrat Party." That, Larry offered, is one of the reasons why Harris is snubbing the dinner, since "it represents a movement that is an anathema to her and her party's political ideology at this point," especially and including on abortion.