It’s been 45 days since Vice President Kamala Harris became the Democrats’ effective nominee to maintain the White House, and she hasn’t held a single press conference or given a single interview to a reporter willing to challenger her on the issues.
But answering serious questions about her policy reversals isn’t the point of a celebrity-style campaign. Harris is competing in a popularity contest as the machine candidate installed to claim the White House, and that requires shielding her from the press.
[LISTEN: Kamala Harris: The Machine Candidate]
With barely two months to go before Election Day, Harris has evaded substantive questions about a sudden whiplash of platform reversals on everything from fracking to immigration. With her first and likely only presidential debate scheduled next week in Philadelphia, Harris even tried to get out of that after she refused requests to expand the calendar for the three traditional forums held by the major party candidates.
According to Politico last week, Harris demanded host network ABC change the rules of the debate to keep the microphones “hot at all times” throughout the discussion after CNN’s June debate muted them once a candidate had finished speaking.
“We have told ABC and other networks seeking to host a possible October debate that we believe both candidates’ mics should be live throughout the full broadcast,” Brian Fallon, a spokesman for the Harris campaign told the magazine. “Our understanding is that Trump’s handlers prefer the muted microphone because they don’t think their candidate can act
