NBC News chief political analyst Chuck Todd called out Vice President Kamala Harris‘ “mistake” in avoiding interviews weeks into her presidential campaign.
It was announced Tuesday that Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, will be sitting down for a joint interview with CNN’s Dana Bash, to be taped Thursday afternoon and air in primetime.
On Wednesday, Todd wrote on NBC News’ website that the Harris campaign’s “first big mistake” was that it had “raised the stakes” of her first interview by lying low for nearly 40 days.
KAMALA HARRIS GRANTS FIRST INTERVIEW TO CNN AFTER WEEKS OF AVOIDING PRESS, TO BE JOINED BY TIM WALZ
NBC News chief political analyst Chuck Todd called out Vice President Kamala Harris’ “mistake” of avoiding the press nearly 40 days into her presidential campaign. (William B. Plowman/NBC via Getty Images)
“I think the easiest way to diffuse this is to go everywhere… doing local interviews, doing a podcast here, she can go to friendly places, go to unfriendly places,” Todd later said on NBC News Now. “The idea when you sort of try to be, you know, laser focused like this… we’re going to gravitate to the big event. If there are six interviews, we’re all overwhelmed… Everything gets diluted.”
“So I really think it only sort of reinforces this negative stereotype that she had coming into this race, which is, you know, she hand-wrings too much, she’s a little- takes too long. There’s a fine line between being deliberative and being paralyzed by a decision, and the way they’ve handled this media stuff- you know, I get it. It is not as important as we think it is. But the way they’ve handled it, I think, is a bit- it’s been a mistake,” Todd continued.
The veteran NBC newsman recalled former President Trump‘s media strategy in 2016, suggesting Harris should take a page from his playbook.
CNN ANCHOR: DID HARRIS ‘WAIT TOO LONG’ TO SCHEDULE HER FIRST INTERVIEW?
Todd says Vice President Kamala Harris avoiding the press is “playing into her perceived weakness.” (REUTERS/Kevin Wurm)
“There’s this allergy to ever doing something that Donald Trump did. But the Donald Trump of 2016- not this guy. This version- he hides from mainstream media quite a bit, but the 2016 version… he did interviews all over the place. Left, right and center, friendly interviews, adversarial interviews, he’d do three or four in a day. In some ways, he preferred that than actually campaigning on the trail,” Todd said. “But what he successfully did is he never made one interview matter, right? It ends up diluting. So just the way they’ve handled this, and I just think they’re now just playing into her perceived weakness. And, you know, any fumble now is going to get overly scrutinized in this interview, unnecessarily so.”
It has been over a month since Harris emerged as the Democratic nominee following President Biden’s dramatic exit from the 2024 race. The VP had been facing growing scrutiny for avoiding interviews and press conferences, which only intensified after last week’s Democratic National Convention.
Harris will have a lot to answer for, including several policy shifts she has apparently undergone, according to anonymous campaign statements to the press. She will likely be asked to explain her sudden evolution on issues like fracking, border security and private health insurance, all of which she took progressive stances on as a presidential candidate in 2019.
Harris will be joined by her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, for their first joint interview with CNN’s Dana Bash. (RONDA CHURCHILL/AFP via Getty Images)
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She will also likely face questions about what she knew about Biden’s mental decline behind the scenes despite defending him publicly after his disastrous debate performance.
Walz, too, will likely face questions over the growing controversy surrounding his military service record as well as his left-wing policies he enacted as Minnesota’s governor.