A new book reveals that aides to the failed 2020 presidential campaign of Vice President Kamala Harris hoped she would never make it to the White House.
The comments are part of “The Truce: Progressives, Centrists and the Future of the Democratic Party,” by Hunter Walker and Luppe B. Luppen. The U.K. Guardian recently published excerpts from the book, which is due out on Jan. 24.
Harris, a senator from California at the time, ran a campaign that crashed and burned before the first votes were taken. She dropped out of the Democratic primary race in December 2019.
In the book, an unnamed campaign aide is quoted as saying the campaign was “rotten from the start.”
“A lot of us, at least folks that I was friends with on the campaign, all realized that: ‘Yeah, this person should not be president of the United States,’” the book quoted the aide as saying.
Harris, the daughter of an Indian immigrant mother and Jamaican immigrant father, was selected as running mate in 2020 after then-Democratic nominee Joe Biden had basically boxed himself in to choosing a black woman. Walker and Luppen quote another aide as saying that Harris’s racial and ethnic background was “a lot of the reason people support her.”
“But you’ve got to back that up with: ‘What are you going to do?’” the aide is quoted as saying.
The book said dysfunction has followed Harris.
“The problems Harris and her team had experienced on her campaign had persisted during her time as vice president,” Walker and Luppen wrote.
Do you think Harris was picked to be VP for the right reasons?
“Harris saw heavy staff turnover, with aides describing a toxic climate riven with factionalism and mismanagement. One source who worked for the vice president declined to go on record or even discuss matters anonymously, due to the heated atmosphere around the office,” the book said. “They refused to characterize the experience of working for Harris, apart from offering a three-word assessment. It was, they said: ‘Game of Thrones.’”
Last year, journalist Franklin Foer’s book “The Last Politician,” portrayed Harris as overly sensitive and contrary, according to Fox News.
“Harris possessed what one of her colleagues described as ‘rabbit ears,’” Foer wrote. “Whenever there was a hint of criticism of her — either in the West Wing or in the press — she seemed instantly aware of it.”
“Rather than brushing it aside, she wanted to know who was speaking ill of her and what they were saying,” the book said, adding that when Harris “read a devastating story” on a website “about her mismanagement of her team,” she “responded by briefly freezing out an aide whom she suspected of cooperating with reporters.”
“She let the criticism guide her,” he added, noting that after being given the mission of addressing the root causes of illegal immigration, she balked.
“Instead of diligently sticking to the Central America assignment, she seemed to accept the conventional wisdom about it. It was a futile gig, so she let it fall to the side, missing an opportunity to grind her way to a meaningful achievement,” the book said.
The book said White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain tried to help Harris, but she was not a willing partner.
“She told him that she didn’t want to work on women’s issues or anything to do with race. She wanted her office to be majority female — and to have a Black woman as chief of staff,” the book said.
Foer wrote that, to “Klain’s ear, she was creating too many rules, and they made it hard for her to find her footing.”
Thomas Gift head of the Centre on U.S. Politics at University College London, said Harris has become a political drag on President Joe Biden, according to Newsweek.
He compared her to Dan Quayle, the vice president under George H.W. Bush from 1989 to 1992, and a man who was the subject of vicious attacks by the establishment media and entertainment celebrities.
“To realize just how unpopular Kamala Harris is, you have to keep in mind the historical significance of it all. No one in her position has had this low of favorabilities in a first term since Dan Quayle. That’s saying something. So it’s no surprise, especially with Biden’s age, that Republicans keep hammering home a simple point: a vote for Biden is a vote for Harris,” he said.
“While it’s usually the top of the ticket that drives voting, and that will be true again in 2024, Harris’ abysmal popularity will matter on the margins. And with next year’s election poised to be close, those margins could end up being a difference-maker,” he said.
