On Wednesday night, Kamala Harris conducted her first ever interview with Fox News. The vice-president was clearly attempting to reach a new audience: the right-wing Fox has a larger share of the cable news audience than CNN and MSNBC combined in most swing states.
The combative sit-down, conducted by Fox News’s Bret Baier, lasted 25 minutes and was hostile almost from the beginning. Baier pressed Harris on points regarding her border policy and President Joe Biden’s record. The two frequently spoke over one another and at one point Harris interjected: “I’m in the middle of responding to the point you’re raising and I’d like to finish.”
Below, the New Statesman’s Katie Stallard and Freddie Hayward break down how the interview went and where we are in the race as the 5 November election day nears.
Freddie: It seems like both Kamala Harris and Donald Trump are quietly panicking as the election looms. The race couldn’t be tighter. They announce stuff. Debates happen. Wars widen. And yet, the polls don’t move. Both know the key demographics they need to win over. Harris has been trying to woo black male voters this week. Trump sat in front of a room of women in Georgia for a Fox News town hall today and claimed to be the “father of IVF”.
Harris followed that up with a lunge across the aisle this evening with an interview on Fox News. Katie, what did you make of it?
Katie: Honestly, I thought this was one of Harris’s strongest interviews. She was repeatedly interrupted by the Fox News anchor, Bret Baier, but I thought she held her own and did an effective job of pivoting to her messages. She does not have a great answer to some of the questions – ie, what she would do differently from Biden, and how she represents a “turning of the page” when she has been part of the administration for 3.5 years – but she managed to get to her key points about the danger Trump poses.
If you see a large part of the point of this interview as talking directly to an audience that generally only hears the caricature version of Harris, then I thought she came across as decent, reasonable, and in command of her facts. She also managed to smuggle in salient points for the Fox News audience about how many prominent Republicans are now campaigning with her, and the number of former Trump national security officials who now say he is a danger to the country and unfit to serve.
What were your impressions?
Freddie: I agree it was one of her stronger interviews but the bar has been very low. Stylistically, she definitely held her own. They both spoke over one another which meant there was little substance. When she was able to speak, she stuck to a familiar script: Trump is bad. Perhaps that was the fault of Bret Baier, but we have also seen the same tactic in her other media performances. On immigration, for instance, her go-to point is that Trump blocked the bipartisan law which would have added more border agents.
Katie: To be fair, he did do that.
Freddie: Definitely, but it speaks to how Harris is pitching herself in the negative. I agree she also struggled with her answer to how her positions have changed since 2019, such as on the border and trans rights. One of her biggest problems right now is that she doesn’t seem to have genuine beliefs. Not explaining why she has changed her mind won’t have helped.
Katie: I agree that we are grading them both on a curve. Harris’s strength has never been interviews, and I think this was one of the better ones. I actually think she was better in a more combative format than when she is trying to remember her talking points in more friendly settings.
Freddie: We saw that in the debate.
Katie: But compared to Trump’s recent performances, she did at least try to engage with the questions, and she can articulate her policy priorities, and give concrete examples. It seems to be baked into Trump’s appearances now that he will ramble on about sharks, or just insist he has different maths, or his interlocutor is wrong, as he did in the Bloomberg interview in Chicago, or bob along to music for half an hour as he did at his town hall the other night. So I think we can fault her on some of the specifics, but we need to be clear about the larger contrast here and what’s going on in Trumpworld. She definitely hasn’t done herself any harm here, and in the grudge match for voters on the margins, I think this potentially helps her case, albeit we can dispute how many genuinely undecided voters there are at this point.
Freddie: Certainly. Trump has long operated on his own plane. And it’s not just parts of the media that give him an easier ride. Some voters forgive his transgressions with the truth because he cuts against what it has meant to be a politician for decades. One question though is not whether that is right or not, but how Harris responds. The Fox News interview was remarkable for its rarity. Both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama did frequent interviews with Fox. Up until now, Harris has been ensconced by her advisers, presumably because they know interviews are one of her weaknesses, and they want to prioritise bringing out the base.
One of the most interesting parts of the interview was when Baier asked why Harris thought so many people would vote for Trump if he was as bad as she said. Were they stupid? he asked. She said: of course not. But she was not as emphatic on Howard Stern last week, when the talk-radio host couldn’t comprehend why anyone in the country would vote for Trump.
What do you think, Katie? Is this a risk for Harris? Is she following Clinton down the deplorables path?
Katie: OK, first, I don’t think we should give Trump the “operating on his own plane” pass – I know you are not saying that about him personally, and I brought up the shark analogy, but I think we are way past the “Trump being Trump” stage when he is talking about prosecuting political enemies, challenging the election result, etc, etc. He is saying some truly disturbing things at the moment, and I think he is running more or less entirely on a fear-based, anti-immigrant, get-out-the-base strategy at this point.
Also, how many hostile interviews has Trump done? I think we need to be careful that we’re not moving the goalposts too much here. First, Harris was criticised for not giving policy specifics, then she gave some; then for not doing enough interviews, then she went on a blitz; now for not doing enough hostile interviews. I think she should do more – don’t get me wrong – but I think we need to compare like with like.
Freddie: And yet, the race is a coin toss. The disturbing things which Trump might be saying are not putting off a sizeable chunk of the electorate. There seems to be an incuriosity among the Harris campaign about why that is the case.
Katie: I wouldn’t say they’re incurious. I think they’re pretty realistic at this stage about how much support is baked in for Trump, despite the convictions, the attempt to overturn the last election, the racism and sexism. The problem is that Harris is effectively representing the current system of government, and Washington politics, which many voters feel is not working for them.
Freddie: I agree, and yet she keeps referencing that Goldman Sachs supports her plans!
Katie: On the deplorables question, I think Harris is painfully aware of how that backfired for Clinton, along with the “I’m with her” slogan, and is trying to show that she gets that people are struggling and don’t think the system is working for them – but also that Trump could not care less about their problems. She is also trying not to pitch herself as a history-making candidate as she has seen how that worked out in 2016.
The unfortunate reality, and I think this should worry us well beyond this election night, is that this country is now deeply split – and has been for some time – and as we are seeing in this election, the number of states, and even counties within those states, that are genuinely up for grabs, is very slim. So whatever happens in this election, close to half the country is going to feel their voice wasn’t heard, and the next person in the White House isn’t their president.
[See also: Kamala Harris must grapple with America’s Founding Fathers]