Vice President Kamala Harris has not held a press conference for 10 days since being named the presumptive Democratic nominee.
On July 22, Harris announced she had secured the nomination by gaining majority backing from nearly 4,000 delegates ahead of next month’s Democratic National Convention. Since then, she has been active on the campaign trail, attending numerous events and engaging with reporters occasionally, yet has not participated in a formal press conference or extensive interview during this period.
Harris, who became the apparent nominee without a single primary vote after President Biden declared he would not run for re-election, has been so notably absent that The New York Times resorted to releasing excerpts from an interview she gave last year to gauge how her perspectives have evolved.
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Vice President Kamala Harris has not held a press conference for 10 days since becoming the presumptive Democratic nominee. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
After Biden’s surprising announcement, a wave of support rallied around Harris from various Democratic leaders, including governors and members of Congress. However, critics have pointed out her absence from the press since then.
National Review’s senior writer Noah Rothman questioned on social media, “When will Kamala Harris hold a press conference?”
The RNC Research account on X highlighted that Harris has only been delivering “teleprompter speeches” in the past 10 days, while conservative commentator Ben Shapiro remarked that she “has not faced a SINGLE tough question in the last week and a half.”
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NewsBusters executive editor Tim Graham speculates that Harris may take a cue from President Biden’s 2020 strategy, during which he was criticized for avoiding the press amid the COVID pandemic.
“Kamala Harris should certainly hold a press conference, especially when she announces her choice for vice-presidential running mate. Yet, we may not see her diverge from Biden’s pattern of avoiding press conferences,” Graham told Fox News Digital.
“Since the 2020 campaign period, we’ve seen the strange situation where Donald Trump has openly given access to networks that scrutinize him, while Biden and Harris avoid interviews with media that celebrate them and their ‘historic accomplishments,'” he added. “They may think the press can never be obsequious enough, or they might simply lack confidence in their ability to articulate coherent responses.”
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Critics have pointed out that Vice President Kamala Harris is yet to hold a formal press conference since President Biden suspended his campaign. (SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images)
DePauw University professor Jeffrey McCall in media studies believes that the Harris campaign is “keenly aware that Biden successfully dodged the media during his 2020 campaign and was still elected.”
“The Harris campaign also knows their candidate struggles in unscripted formats, and a press conference or genuine interview would require her to account for her positions, past statements, and record. Hence, emulating the Biden basement campaign style seems advantageous, as long as they sprinkle in some rallies featuring Megan Thee Stallion,” he remarked, referencing the rapper’s appearance at Harris’ Atlanta rally.
He suggested that Harris likely feels no urgency “to hold a press conference just because she has become the nominee” since Democrats are likely to support her regardless.
“Her supporters don’t demand accountability or have much interest in her policy details; simply not being Biden or Trump suffices for them,” McCall observed.
“From a strategic communication perspective, however, Harris would benefit from hosting a press conference and engaging in serious journalistic interviews,” he continued. “Ultimately, she will have to appeal to moderates or undecided voters who expect her to answer questions.”
The Harris campaign did not respond promptly to a request for comment.
The Democratic National Convention is set to begin on August 19 in Chicago.
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Fox News Digital’s Paul Steinhauser contributed to this report.
