Vice President Kamala Harris has gone 26 days as of Friday without holding a formal press conference or sit-down interview since becoming the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee.
While she has been busy on the campaign trail, spoken at various events, and given informal remarks to reporters at various points since effectively replacing President Biden on the ticket last month, she hasn’t done a formal press conference or wide-ranging interview in the three-plus weeks that have followed.
Former President Trump held his second press conference in a week on Thursday at Bedminster, and since Aug. 6, he’s answered 81 questions in pressers and interviews, including a two-hour session with supporter Elon Musk this week.
In that same period, Harris has done brief “gaggles” as well as off-the-record sessions with traveling reporters, but she still hasn’t done anything formal with the press. She’s even turned down TIME, which published a gushing piece about “Her Moment” this week for a cover story, and running mate Tim Walz shot down a formal interview request from the New York Times about his response to the George Floyd riots in Minnesota.
The left-leaning Washington Post editorial board challenged Harris over dodging the media on Sunday, saying of her opponent, “at least he has taken questions.” The Post said she should account for her numerous policy shifts, including on fracking, border security and private health insurance.
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CNN’s John Berman pressed Harris spokeswoman Adrienne Elrod on the issue on Tuesday, saying the candidate clearly had time to do an interview if Harris was so inclined. That same day, Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., told Berman that Harris couldn’t face difficult questions because she had an “indefensible” record.
Liberal CNN anchor Jim Acosta chided the campaign about the issue on Wednesday, asking communications director Michael Tyler, “Would it kill you guys” to do one? Tyler laughed before reiterating Harris’ vague pledge to do an interview by the end of the month.
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“We will commit to directly engage with the voters who are actually going to decide this election,” Tyler said. “And that is going to be complete with rallies, with sit-down interviews, with press conferences, with all the digital assets that we have at our disposal.”
During a press conference in Detroit last week, GOP vice-presidential candidate JD Vance urged reporters to “show a little bit of self-awareness” and pushed Harris to “do the job of a presidential candidate” by speaking to them.
Vance sat down with three Sunday shows on Aug. 11, taking sharp questions from CNN, CBS and ABC, while Harris and Walz sent surrogates.
Trump also hit her lack of media access during his lengthy news conference at Mar-a-Lago last week.
“She doesn’t know how to do a news conference; she’s not smart enough to do a news conference,” he said.
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For all the talk among progressives about the importance of the media in the Trump era, some in Harris’ orbit are defiant about her not speaking to reporters.
“Who cares?” CNN commentator and former Bill Clinton aide Paul Begala said about the issue on Wednesday.
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Former Obama administration ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul wrote on X that Harris’ “paramount objective” was to win.
“If a press conference helps her win, she should do it. If not, she shouldn’t do it. It’s just that simple. She has no ‘moral obligation’ to talk to the press. Tone it down folks,” he wrote.
Five years earlier, however, he wrote, “People who believe in truth and transparency should not be afraid of the press.”
NewsBusters executive editor Tim Graham expects Harris to follow President Biden’s 2020 playbook, when he was famously accused of hiding in his basement during the COVID pandemic.
“Kamala Harris should absolutely hold a press conference. One would expect it when she names her vice-presidential pick. But we cannot expect her to break from Biden’s serial avoidance of press conferences,” Graham told Fox News Digital.
“Since the 2020 campaign, we have witnessed the bizarre spectacle of Donald Trump granting wide access to networks that suggest he’s a fascist and hammer him daily, while Biden and Harris won’t grant interviews to media outlets that gurgle all over them and their ‘historic accomplishments,’” he continued. “Either they think the press can never be servile enough or they are projecting a complete lack of confidence in their efforts to put complete sentences together.”
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The Harris campaign told Fox News Digital last week that it was conducting a strategy to best reach voters.
“With under 90 days to go, the Vice President’s top priority is earning the support of the voters who will decide this election,” a spokesperson said. “In a limited time period and a fragmented media environment, that requires us being strategic, creative, and expeditious in getting our message to those voters in the ways that are most impactful – through paid media, on the ground organizing, an aggressive campaign schedule, and of course interviews that reach our target voters. It’s a far cry from Trump’s losing, ineffective strategy of rage-posting, accosting reporters, and insulting the voters he’ll need to win.
“If Donald Trump is so concerned about the success of VP Harris’ campaign blitz, he could, you know, get out there on the campaign trail. We are more than happy for him to shed a spotlight on his election-losing agenda: terminating the ACA, killing a bipartisan border bill, and supporting a national abortion ban.”
Fox News Digital’s Paul Steinhauser contributed to this report.
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