(Savannah) Vice President Kamala Harris defended her departure from some of her more liberal positions in her first major television interview of her presidential campaign Thursday, but insisted her “values have not changed,” even as she “seeks consensus.”
Sitting with her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Ms.me Harris was asked about changes in her policies over the years, particularly her reversals on fracking and decriminalizing illegal border crossings.
“I think the most important and significant aspect of my political perspective and my decisions is that my values have not changed,” she said.
“I think it’s important to build consensus. It’s important to find a common place of understanding where we can actually solve the problem,” she continued.
The interview with CNN’s Dana Bash comes as voters continue to try to learn more about the Democratic ticket in an unusually tight timeframe — Joe Biden resigned just five weeks ago. The focus was largely on policy, as Harris sought to show she has taken more moderate positions on issues Republicans view as extreme, while Tim Walz defended misguided statements made in the past.
Joint interviews in an election year are a constant in politics; Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, Donald Trump and Mike Pence, Barack Obama and Joe Biden — all have done them at similar points in the race. The difference is that the other candidates have all done solo interviews, too. Kamala Harris hasn’t done an in-depth interview since becoming her party’s standard-bearer five weeks ago, though she did sit in for several weeks while she was still Biden’s running mate.
The latter said serving alongside Joe Biden was “one of the greatest honors” of her career, and she recounted the moment he called her to tell her he was withdrawing from the race and would support her candidacy.
“He told me what he had decided to do and… I asked him, ‘Are you sure?’ and he said, ‘Yes,’ and that’s how I found out.”
She said she did not ask him to support her because he had “made it clear” that he would do so.
Kamala Harris defended the administration’s record on the southern border and immigration, stressing that she was tasked with trying to address the “root causes” in other countries that were driving border crossings.
“We have laws that must be followed and enforced, that address people who cross our border illegally and who must suffer the consequences,” she said.
Asked about Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, she said, “I am unequivocal and unwavering in my commitment to the defense of Israel and its ability to defend itself.” But the vice president also reiterated what she has been saying for months: that civilian deaths are too high amid the fighting.
She also brushed aside questions about Republican Donald Trump’s claim that she “became black.” Harris, who is of black and South Asian descent, said it was the “same old tired playbook.”
“Next question, please.”
Donald Trump and Kamala Harris are scheduled to debate on September 10. In a post Thursday night, the former president appeared to be paying close attention to the interview. After discussing the debate, he posted: “I am so looking forward to debating Comrade Kamala Harris and exposing her as a fraud.”
The latter went on to say that his Democratic opponent “has changed every single long-held position he has held, on everything. America will never allow a Marxist who manipulates elections to become president of the United States.”
The debate will be the first meeting between the two candidates. The opponents had only been in the same space when Kamala Harris, as a senator, attended Donald Trump’s State of the Union addresses.
Tim Walz questioned
During the interview, Tim Walz watched and nodded as his colleague presented her main points. He was asked if there were any inaccuracies in his statements, starting with how he described his 24 years of service in the National Guard.
In one segment of a 2018 video that the Harris-Walz campaign circulated, Walz spoke out against gun violence, saying, “We can make sure that these weapons of war, that I carried in war, are the only place that these weapons are.”
Critics said the “I wore them during the war” comment suggested Walz was presenting himself as someone who spent time in a combat zone, but a campaign spokesman said he misspoke.
PHOTO KAITLIN MCKEOWN, ASSOCIATED PRESS
Democratic vice presidential candidate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz talks with a volunteer during a visit to a campaign office in Raleigh, N.C., Thursday, Aug. 29, 2024.
Asked about statements that seemed to indicate that he and his wife had conceived their children through in vitro fertilization, when they had in fact used a less controversial fertility treatment, he said he thought most Americans understood that it was the Trump campaign splitting hairs.
Democrats’ enthusiasm about voting in November has surged in recent months, according to a Gallup poll. About eight in 10 Democrats now say they are more enthusiastic than usual about voting, up from 55% in March.
That gives them an edge in enthusiasm that they didn’t have earlier this year. Republican excitement has increased much less over the same period, and about two-thirds of Republicans now say they’re more excited than usual about voting.