Joe Biden told CNN he would consider Sen. Kamala Harris as a potential running mate, a day after she dropped out of the presidential race.
Said Biden: “Of course I would. Look, Sen. Harris has the capacity to be anything she wants to be. I mean it sincerely. I talked to her yesterday. She’s solid, she can be president someday herself, she can be vice president, she could go on to be a Supreme Court justice, she could be attorney general. I mean she has enormous capability.”
“A South Carolina aide for Tom Steyer’s 2020 presidential campaign stole valuable volunteer data collected by Kamala Harris’ campaign using an account from when he worked with the S.C. Democratic Party,” the Charleston Post & Courier reports.
“The Steyer campaign said that it does not have possession of the data and that Democratic officials were only aware of the download, which they said was inadvertent, because they proactively notified them. Both the Democratic National Committee and S.C. Democratic Party denied that.”
“In better times, Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign was full of flash: a launch rally that drew more than 20,000 people to Oakland, a five-day summer tour of Iowa on a luxury bus with her name blazing from the side in colorful capital letters, a robust multi-state operation headquartered in Baltimore,” the Los Angeles Times reports.
“Now, the bus has been swapped for a nondescript black SUV. The campaign stops are more intimate than immense — a few dozen people in a pastoral red barn, several hundred in a pub. And her efforts have narrowed to a single make-or-break prize: Iowa.”
“To revive her flagging campaign, Harris is betting big on going small. It is a marked tonal shift and a strategy born of necessity, reflecting her dwindling cash and limp poll numbers.”
“Kamala Harris ’s campaign says she is focusing her efforts on Iowa in the hopes of reviving her struggling campaign,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“The California senator isn’t the first to try this. Virtually every election cycle, faltering presidential candidates go all in on the first state to hold its nominating contest, hoping that a strong showing there will give them a boost.”
“I’m fucking moving to Iowa.”
— Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA), in a joke to Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-HI) overheard by journalist Matt Laslo.
Kamala Harris’ campaign is setting up an early goal post, vowing to achieve a top-three finish in the Iowa caucuses, CBS News reports.
Said campaign manager Juan Rodriguez: “We want to make sure that we have a strong top-three finish. I think that will kind of continue to give us a slingshot to go into that early primary state calendar and then make sure that we’re also competitive heading into Super Tuesday.”
First Read: “By the way, while Warren, Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders all hit the campaign trail right after debate night in Houston, voters won’t see Kamala Harris at a public event until this Thursday in Iowa.”
“The last time Harris held a public event was Sept. 7 in New Hampshire, where she attended the VoteVets forum ahead of the state convention — so that’ll be 12 days off the trail for her when it comes to public events. Instead, Harris is spending the week on a fundraising swing through the east coast, holding events in New York, Connecticut and Baltimore.”
“As the third quarter fundraising deadline approaches on Sept. 30, Harris faces pressure to haul in big numbers, especially after bringing in just $12 million in the last quarter.”
“Sen. Kamala Harris’ top donors, including those who have contributed or opened their networks to her, are privately acknowledging that if she doesn’t perform well on Thursday, she could start losing the support of wealthy financiers,” CNBC reports.
“In discussions with donors and those close to lead financiers, there is a growing consensus that the California lawmaker needs to have a strong outing against the nine other contenders if she wants to maintain an alliance with many big money donors that have donated to multiple campaigns, including hers.”
Bloomberg: “Yet despite a shot of adrenaline after confronting front-runner Joe Biden in the first debate, she has failed to catch fire with Democratic voters who are torn between a nostalgic fondness for Biden and a revolutionary desire for Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren.”
“Harris’s attempt to replicate her feat in the second debate backfired among Democrats who say she went too negative on Biden. The Californian also suffers from a perception that she lacks a deep ideological well to guide her policy ideas, in contrast to her three main rivals who are better-defined. And her past as a prosecutor has earned her supporters and detractors.”
“Sen. Kamala Harris raised over $1 million through several campaign fundraisers in the wealthy enclaves of the Hamptons on Long Island and Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts,” CNBC reports.
“Harris attended multiple events last weekend in the affluent vacation spots, including five in the Hamptons. The massive haul comes after she suffered a quick decline in national polls.”
Fox Nation host Tomi Lahren suggested in a tweet that Sen. Kamala Harris “slept her way to the top” when she had a relationship in the mid-1990s with former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown.
Daily Beast: “Lahren was swiftly condemned for invoking Harris’ personal relationship to dismiss the 2020 candidate’s long record in elected office, rising from San Francisco district attorney to California’s attorney general before being elected to the U.S. Senate. But while the tweet attracted its share of liberal critics, some of Lahren’s own colleagues at Fox News openly expressed disgust at her comments.”
“CNN’s president, a media titan at the helm of a global news organization intensely covering the 2020 presidential election, has a longstanding personal rule against supporting politicians,” McClatchy reports.
“He’s broken it once — for Kamala Harris when she ran to become the first woman of color to hold the office of California attorney general a decade ago.”
Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI) panned Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) as being unqualified to be president, The Hill reports.
Said Gabbard: “I think one of the things I’m most concerned with is, Kamala Harris is not qualified to serve as commander in chief, and I can say this from a personal perspective as a soldier. She’s got no background or experience in foreign policy, and she lacks the temperament that is necessary for a commander-in-chief.”
Sen. Kamala Harris raised nearly $12 million in the past three months, the New York Times reports.
“Ms. Harris’s total for the second quarter of the year, which ended on Sunday, was padded by a strong finish. She collected more than $2 million in online donations in the first 24 hours after the start of last Thursday’s Democratic debate, as well as an additional $1.2 million online last weekend, her team said.”
“Ms. Harris’s second-quarter number is far below what some other first-tier candidates reported this week.”
It’s probably not a mistake she announced it on the Friday of a holiday weekend.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) told Face the Nation that Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) will be “a force to be reckoned with” following her strong performance in the first Democratic debate this week.
Said Graham: “One thing I’ll say about Kamala Harris, and I said this before, she’s got game. She is very talented, she’s very smart, and she’ll be a force to be reckoned with.”
President Trump said Sen. Kamala Harris “received too much credit” for her attack on Joe Biden at Thursday night’s Democratic presidential debate, Politico reports.
Said Trump: “I think she was given too much credit for what she did. It wasn’t that outstanding. I think probably he was hit harder than he should have been hit.”
He added: “It was right out of the can. It was right out of the box. He didn’t respond great. This is not Winston Churchill we’re dealing with, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as they portend it to be.”
Ezra Klein: “Sen. Kamala Harris is the closest Democrats have to a potential consensus candidate. She doesn’t suffer from the enmity that Hillary Clinton voters have for Sen. Bernie Sanders, or that leftists hold for former Vice President Joe Biden, or that the Obama administration has for Elizabeth Warren.”
“She’s not another white guy running to represent a diverse party. She’s got enough political experience to be a credible candidate, but not so much that she’s been on the wrong side of dozens of controversial issues.”
Jonathan Chait: “Debates don’t always matter or have clear effects, but the second night of the first round had one very likely effect: Kamala Harris is going to be propelled into the first tier of candidates.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.