A lengthy analysis of Kamala Harris’ performance as vice president, the first minority woman VP, by the leftist CNN concludes she’s crashing.
CNN interviewed several dozen sources and explained that “exasperation and dysfunction” are playing prominent roles in the Biden White House when it comes to the nation’s second-in-command.
CNN warns that key West Wing “aides” already “have largely thrown up their hands at Vice President Kamala Harris and her staff – deciding there simply isn’t time to deal with them right now.”
And, CNN explains, Harris is frustrated that she’s been given a number of dead-end assignments that can only undercut her prospects for a political future.
The analysis said, “Interviews with nearly three dozen former and current Harris aides, administration officials, Democratic operatives, donors and outside advisers — who spoke extensively to CNN — reveal a complex reality inside the White House. Many in the vice president’s circle fume that she’s not being adequately prepared or positioned, and instead is being sidelined. The vice president herself has told several confidants she feels constrained in what she’s able to do politically. And those around her remain wary of even hinting at future political ambitions, with Biden’s team highly attuned to signs of disloyalty, particularly from the vice president.”
Whether any 2024 events will involve her supporting a candidate who would want voters to let him govern even as he approaches 90 years old, or she’s running her own candidacy, “Few of the insiders who spoke with CNN think she’s being well-prepared for whichever role it will be.”
The analysis describes her has having a “rocky relationship with some parts of the White House.”
Her supporters, too, “see no coherent public sense of what she’s done or been trying to do as vice president,” CNN concluded.
And the dissatisfaction goes both ways, apparently, as CNN said there’s a “rumor” that Biden will “replace her” by nominating her to the Supreme Court at some point.
Eleni Kounalakis, California’s lieutenant governor and a longtime Harris promoter, said, “It is natural that those of us who know her know how much more helpful she can be than she is currently being asked to be.”
Other Democrats who may want to challenge for the party’s next presidential nomination, “have started privately acknowledging that they are trying to figure out how to quietly lay the groundwork to run if and when Harris falters, as they think she might.”
CNN documented that the sources, “speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the situation more frankly,” tell one narrative; “Harris’ staff has repeatedly failed her and left her exposed, and family members have often had an informal say within her office. Even some who have been asked for advice lament Harris’ overly cautious tendencies and staff problems, which have been a feature of every office she’s held, from San Francisco district attorney to U.S. Senate.”
In fact, WND reported already last summer multiple allegations had surfaced that her office staffers claim they are treated poorly and forced to work in a “blame culture.”
As Politico reported then, “There is dysfunction inside the VP’s office, aides and administration officials say. And it’s emanating from the top.”
The report explained that Harris’ decision to visit the Mexican border – more than three months after she was given the responsibility for the crisis by President Biden – left her office staff members “blindsided.”
“For days, aides and outside allies had been calling and texting with each other about the political fallout that a potential trip would entail. But when it became known that she was going to El Paso, it left many scrambling, including officials who were responsible for making travel arrangements and others outside the VP’s office charged with crafting the messaging across the administration,” the report said.
But that was only one bit of recent chaos in the vice president’s office.
“Harris’ team is experiencing low morale, porous lines of communication and diminished trust among aides and senior officials. Much of the frustration internally is directed at Tina Flournoy, Harris’ chief of staff, a veteran of Democratic politics who began working for her earlier this year,” the report said, explaining that was based on interviews with 22 current and former aides, officials and associates.
The Politico report said one of its sources said, “People are thrown under the bus from the very top, there are short fuses and it’s an abusive environment. It’s not a healthy environment and people often feel mistreated. It’s not a place where people feel supported but a place where people feel treated like s—.”
CNN said Harris, herself, has complained about “not being a greater part of the president’s approach to the Afghanistan withdrawal – despite telling CNN at the time she was the last one in the room when he made the decision.
“Now many of those close to her feel like he’s shirking his political duties to promote her, and essentially setting her up to fail. Her fans are panicked, watching her poll numbers sink even lower than Biden’s, worrying that even the base Democratic vote is starting to give up on her,” CNN said.
In fact, while Biden’s approval ratings have plunged into the upper 30s in recent polls, Harris’s ratings have sunk like a rock, and are down into the 20s. This results bode ill for the Democratic party in 2022, and certainly could impact even the 2024 presidential race where the party’s candidate could be up against a resurgent President Donald Trump.
Even a donor to Biden told CNN the president “would be putting her in positions to succeed, as opposed to putting weights on her.”
For example. Harris asked to be assigned to fight Republican voter integrity efforts, but Biden has been “slow” on it.
“Harris has told confidants that she has been enjoying a good working dynamic directly with Biden, [but] those who work for them describe their relationship in terms of settling into an exhausted stalemate,” CNN warned.
The analysis explained, “The list of complaints between the West Wing and the vice president’s office keeps growing, even stemming from Harris’ first assignment from Biden this spring. The situation has become a back and forth of irritations — some real, some perceived.
“Harris’ team was mad Biden had assigned her to handle diplomatic relations with the Northern Triangle nations, in hopes of addressing the root causes of migration to the U.S., but gave her no role on the southern border itself.”
CNN continued, “Harris herself has said she didn’t want to be assigned to manage the border, aware that it was a no-win political situation that would only sandbag her in the future. But Biden’s team was annoyed that Harris fumbled answers about the border, including when she gave an awkward, laughing response about not visiting it during a spring interview with NBC’s Lester Holt.”
It was Fernando García, of the organization called Border Network for Human Rights, who met with Harris during her visit to El Paso, Texas, this summer, on the issue of illegal aliens.
Later, though, he said she simply “disappeared.”
“We haven’t seen her leadership,” he charged.
Even Donna Brazile, “one of several prominent Black women who urged Biden advisers to put Harris on the ticket, agreed that it’s time to retool after the rough first year,” CNN said.
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