PART 2:
Harris defenders say this isn’t about reassuring Americans they’d be in good hands reelecting the Biden-Harris ticket even if tragedy struck but serve the larger project of getting Americans used to something unfamiliar: A Black woman in a position of political power.
“What we have in Vice President Harris is a competent, capable, intelligent, authentic leader of color,” said Laphonza Butler, a former senior aide who is now the president of EMILY’s List. “People have to get comfortable seeing women, and women of color, in places of leadership, period.”
Supporting, without supplanting, Biden in the campaign
To Biden advisers, the images of the president walking the streets of Kyiv in his aviators – on top of a report from his doctor after his latest physical which referred to him as “vigorous” – answer any of the questions of whether he’s up to running a normal campaign.
Suggestions that Harris will have a more active role on the trail or in any way pick up slack from a lightened Biden schedule are immediately shot down by the West Wing and the vice president’s office, who coordinate to insist the point is moot because there won’t be any slack to pick up.
Not that they expect much stumping for at least a year, even if Biden makes a formal reelection announcement in the coming months, with a focus on promoting his legislative agenda more than official political events.
Same for Harris: “She can do a lot of outreach and a lot of effective communication on behalf of this administration without having to be in candidate mode,” a senior Biden adviser said.
Many Democrats say Biden should do more to lift up Harris – the person he anointed as the future of the party – even if they don’t know exactly how.
“I think it’s up to the president to answer that question, not me,” said Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, who briefly ran in the 2020 primary race against Biden and Harris.
Several strategists preparing for a reelection campaign say that if all Harris did was help drive up Black turnout by championing issues that matter to those voters and light up women – including suburban women – on anger over Republicans’ abortion restrictions, that in itself might be enough to win Biden a second term.
That was a big part of why Washington Sen. Patty Murray said she asked Harris to come campaign in her surprisingly intense reelection race last year.
“She was just a dynamo. She was powerful. She was moving. She spoke about what’s at stake,” Murray said, calling the appearance “a great turning point for all of us.”
Murray acknowledged that it isn’t the sense many have of Harris but argued that if more Americans see the vice president talking about women’s rights and civil rights the way she did, they might change their views.
But forcing voters to give her a second look, Murray said, is part of what can come out of a reelection campaign.
“She’s an invaluable asset,” said New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, one of the Democratic senators who embraced Harris since she first arrived in Washington. “In some of the tough battleground states, she’s going to be pretty damn powerful, frankly.”
A disorienting time warp despite internal changes
Harris has shaken up some of her operations, bringing on a new chief of staff, a deputy chief of staff and press secretary all known to and favored by the West Wing.
Cedric Richmond, the former congressman and Biden White House adviser, met with Harris several times himself over the last year. His advice, he recalled, started with the psychological – “Ignore the haters. Ignore the noise. Do what you’ve been called to do.”
But it also was practical, matching what others have told her: She needed to get out more, both for the sake of people seeing her and for getting more comfortable in public.
Pointing to Harris’ work on issues like HBCU funding, police reform and expanding access to health care, Booker said, “I can’t think of a time that I’ve seen somebody have earned her chops but not get the credit where credit is due,” capturing a pervasive feeling among the vice president’s defenders.
Some adjustments were made. Others were not, in part because of Harris’s own resistance. Her second communications director in two years, meanwhile, departed the office around New Year’s for family reasons. A search for a replacement or possible restructuring to give Harris what several involved feel is a much needed role of senior counselor, has remained underway for months.
In her midterm travel and over the holidays, Harris began reconnecting with old donors, advisers and friends, people close to Harris told CNN. Freed from most pandemic concerns, she hosted a string of holiday receptions at the Naval Observatory, including a big bash in December that a wider world of supporters flew into Washington for. She reached out to members of the media she didn’t know.
But that was followed by more questions about whether she is up for the job – including in a new round of negative news stories that Harris loyalists felt contained backstabbing from supposed friends.
“Folks are going to take shots because folks would hope to see themselves where she stands,” said one Harris aide. “The trap is to get distracted by that.”
But the frustration that the vice president is constantly being judged by different standards is hard to get past.
“Who the f**k knew what Mike Pence was doing?” one senior Harris aide told CNN in exasperation.
‘Momentum’ as mantra
Harris’ team has embraced Biden’s move toward running again, grateful for the spotlight to be off her for a few more years and getting a break from every move she makes potentially being interpreted as subterfuge to nudge him off the stage.
“Momentum” is the theme of her new stump speech for a reelection a campaign, which she road-tested in a well-received speech at the DNC in February. It’s meant as a catchphrase for Democrats and as a mantra for her, especially as her team continues to plan a schedule which will have her traveling at least one day each week.
Harris fought to attend Tyre Nichols’ funeral in February after winter storm weather canceled flights across the country. To Sharpton, the impromptu speech he invited her to give proved criticisms against her are “unfounded.”
“Americans saw for what it was,” Sharpton said. “She was speaking from the heart.”
Still, despite any momentum they might feel, the issue of Biden’s age continues to creep in every conversation about Harris’s role.
“She’ll never be a ‘normal VP,’” South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn, the assistant Democratic leader in the House and a key booster of both Biden and Harris, told CNN. “My goodness, she’s the first African American VP. She’s the first Asian American VP. This is the first female VP, having to be normal. How can it be normal? It’s never going to be normal.”
To Murray, it remains more basic than that.
“Everyone who says you can’t do something,” she said, “is afraid that you will.”
Harris defenders say this isn’t about reassuring Americans they’d be in good hands reelecting the Biden-Harris ticket even if tragedy struck but serve the larger project of getting Americans used to something unfamiliar: A Black woman in a position of political power.
“What we have in Vice President Harris is a competent, capable, intelligent, authentic leader of color,” said Laphonza Butler, a former senior aide who is now the president of EMILY’s List. “People have to get comfortable seeing women, and women of color, in places of leadership, period.”
Supporting, without supplanting, Biden in the campaign
To Biden advisers, the images of the president walking the streets of Kyiv in his aviators – on top of a report from his doctor after his latest physical which referred to him as “vigorous” – answer any of the questions of whether he’s up to running a normal campaign.
Suggestions that Harris will have a more active role on the trail or in any way pick up slack from a lightened Biden schedule are immediately shot down by the West Wing and the vice president’s office, who coordinate to insist the point is moot because there won’t be any slack to pick up.
Not that they expect much stumping for at least a year, even if Biden makes a formal reelection announcement in the coming months, with a focus on promoting his legislative agenda more than official political events.
Same for Harris: “She can do a lot of outreach and a lot of effective communication on behalf of this administration without having to be in candidate mode,” a senior Biden adviser said.
Many Democrats say Biden should do more to lift up Harris – the person he anointed as the future of the party – even if they don’t know exactly how.
“I think it’s up to the president to answer that question, not me,” said Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, who briefly ran in the 2020 primary race against Biden and Harris.
Several strategists preparing for a reelection campaign say that if all Harris did was help drive up Black turnout by championing issues that matter to those voters and light up women – including suburban women – on anger over Republicans’ abortion restrictions, that in itself might be enough to win Biden a second term.
That was a big part of why Washington Sen. Patty Murray said she asked Harris to come campaign in her surprisingly intense reelection race last year.
“She was just a dynamo. She was powerful. She was moving. She spoke about what’s at stake,” Murray said, calling the appearance “a great turning point for all of us.”
Murray acknowledged that it isn’t the sense many have of Harris but argued that if more Americans see the vice president talking about women’s rights and civil rights the way she did, they might change their views.
But forcing voters to give her a second look, Murray said, is part of what can come out of a reelection campaign.
“She’s an invaluable asset,” said New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, one of the Democratic senators who embraced Harris since she first arrived in Washington. “In some of the tough battleground states, she’s going to be pretty damn powerful, frankly.”
A disorienting time warp despite internal changes
Harris has shaken up some of her operations, bringing on a new chief of staff, a deputy chief of staff and press secretary all known to and favored by the West Wing.
Cedric Richmond, the former congressman and Biden White House adviser, met with Harris several times himself over the last year. His advice, he recalled, started with the psychological – “Ignore the haters. Ignore the noise. Do what you’ve been called to do.”
But it also was practical, matching what others have told her: She needed to get out more, both for the sake of people seeing her and for getting more comfortable in public.
Pointing to Harris’ work on issues like HBCU funding, police reform and expanding access to health care, Booker said, “I can’t think of a time that I’ve seen somebody have earned her chops but not get the credit where credit is due,” capturing a pervasive feeling among the vice president’s defenders.
Some adjustments were made. Others were not, in part because of Harris’s own resistance. Her second communications director in two years, meanwhile, departed the office around New Year’s for family reasons. A search for a replacement or possible restructuring to give Harris what several involved feel is a much needed role of senior counselor, has remained underway for months.
In her midterm travel and over the holidays, Harris began reconnecting with old donors, advisers and friends, people close to Harris told CNN. Freed from most pandemic concerns, she hosted a string of holiday receptions at the Naval Observatory, including a big bash in December that a wider world of supporters flew into Washington for. She reached out to members of the media she didn’t know.
But that was followed by more questions about whether she is up for the job – including in a new round of negative news stories that Harris loyalists felt contained backstabbing from supposed friends.
“Folks are going to take shots because folks would hope to see themselves where she stands,” said one Harris aide. “The trap is to get distracted by that.”
But the frustration that the vice president is constantly being judged by different standards is hard to get past.
“Who the f**k knew what Mike Pence was doing?” one senior Harris aide told CNN in exasperation.
‘Momentum’ as mantra
Harris’ team has embraced Biden’s move toward running again, grateful for the spotlight to be off her for a few more years and getting a break from every move she makes potentially being interpreted as subterfuge to nudge him off the stage.
“Momentum” is the theme of her new stump speech for a reelection a campaign, which she road-tested in a well-received speech at the DNC in February. It’s meant as a catchphrase for Democrats and as a mantra for her, especially as her team continues to plan a schedule which will have her traveling at least one day each week.
Harris fought to attend Tyre Nichols’ funeral in February after winter storm weather canceled flights across the country. To Sharpton, the impromptu speech he invited her to give proved criticisms against her are “unfounded.”
“Americans saw for what it was,” Sharpton said. “She was speaking from the heart.”
Still, despite any momentum they might feel, the issue of Biden’s age continues to creep in every conversation about Harris’s role.
“She’ll never be a ‘normal VP,’” South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn, the assistant Democratic leader in the House and a key booster of both Biden and Harris, told CNN. “My goodness, she’s the first African American VP. She’s the first Asian American VP. This is the first female VP, having to be normal. How can it be normal? It’s never going to be normal.”
To Murray, it remains more basic than that.
“Everyone who says you can’t do something,” she said, “is afraid that you will.”
