President Joe Biden’s campaign is ramping up its defense of Kamala Harris on the anniversary of his selecting her as his running mate to counter attacks from Republican presidential candidates who see her as a liability for his reelection bid.
(Bloomberg) — President Joe Biden’s campaign is ramping up its defense of Kamala Harris on the anniversary of his selecting her as his running mate to counter attacks from Republican presidential candidates who see her as a liability for his reelection bid.
Biden campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez and senior adviser Becca Siegel called Harris a “fearless and effective messenger” and an “essential partner in the ticket’s electoral success and the historic record of accomplishments in the first two years of the Biden-Harris Administration,” in a memo released Friday.
“As we enter the heart of the 2024 cycle, Vice President Harris is positioned once again to be a strong political force and invaluable asset to the Biden-Harris reelection effort,” they added, and laid out Harris’s popularity with key parts of Biden’s electoral coalition, in particular young voters, people of color and women.
The pair also highlight the vice president’s new visibility on the trail, where she has become a vocal advocate on issues the campaign sees as critical for bringing supporters to the polls in 2024, such as voting rights, gun safety, and in particular abortion, on which Harris has been the White House’s most prominent voice.
Biden tapped Harris to be his running mate three years ago, and she went on to make history as the first woman, Black American and Asian American to hold the role. While Harris is popular with Democratic constituencies, polls show voters at large are unsatisfied with her performance in office. A CNN poll conducted in July by SSRS finds 57% disapprove of Harris with 42% approving, similar to the president’s numbers.
“Picking Kamala as my eventual vice president was one of the best decisions I made as a presidential nominee,” Biden said in a fundraising appeal Friday, crediting her with helping pass gun-safety legislation and energizing voters to hit the polls to protect abortion rights.
Republicans have seized on her unpopularity and concerns about the health of Biden, who at 80 is already the oldest US president, to target Harris. Republicans have reminded voters Harris would assume the presidency if Biden cannot finish his term.
Former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, a 2024 GOP hopeful, signed a pledge the Republican National Committee is requiring of candidates to participate in their first debate later this month. But on the pledge, she crossed out a “Beat Biden” logo to instead read “Beat President Harris,” and shared the image on X, the social platform formerly known as Twitter.
The White House has sought to boost Harris’s profile in recent months, dispatching her across the country to hit back at the president’s Republican critics.
Harris in a speech in Jacksonville, Florida, last month challenged the state’s governor and GOP presidential contender Ron DeSantis over educational standards that suggest enslaved people learned valuable skills from slavery.
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