Kamala Harris’s senior campaign adviser complained that Wednesday’s much anticipated Fox News interview with Harris was an “ambush” after Fox’s Bret Baier repeatedly pressed Harris to directly answer questions.
David Plouffe, former President Barack Obama’s campaign mastermind who joined Harris’s presidential campaign in August, made the charge after a half-hour interview in which Harris seemed to grow frustrated after being unable to answer Baier’s questions about her record.
“Kamala Harris (strong) handled an ambush Fox interview light years better than the hash Donald Trump (unstable) made of the Fox pep rally disguised as a town hall,” Plouffe tweeted after the interview aired.
Wednesday’s interview was an anticipated moment in Harris’s brief campaign during which she has avoided press conferences and tough interviews, only recently – after her small post-Democratic National Convention polling bump evaporated – choosing to sit for regularly scheduled interviews, generally with friendly podcasters or Democrat-friendly interviewers.
Wednesday’s Fox interview was a marked change – and perhaps an experiment – for the Vice President’s campaign as it seeks to reverse her slide in the final days of the campaign.
Yet Harris repeatedly pivoted to Trump rather than answer straightforward questions about her record.
Trump has regularly sat for interviews and taken media questions throughout his campaign, sitting for an extensive interview Tuesday with Bloomberg News Editor-in-Chief John Micklethwait.
As Harris’s polling in critical swing states has turned sour, her campaign has begun attempts to portray Trump as “unstable,” as Plouffe phrased in his tweet. Harris repeatedly channeled her senior adviser’s attack on Trump Wednesday, often altogether ignoring questions on her record.
At one point, after Harris was again pressed on how she would turn the page from the Biden-Harris administration, an exasperated Harris responded. “You and I both know what I’m talking about.”
“I actually don’t,” Baier interjected. “What are you talking about?”
Bradley Jaye is a Capitol Hill Correspondent for Breitbart News. Follow him on X/Twitter at @BradleyAJaye.
