Allies of Vice President Kamala Harris suggested in a report published by CNN that the Biden administration was racist for not doing more to defend Harris publicly as her poll numbers sink so low that some reports have stated that she is the least popular vice president since the 1970s.
“Many in the vice president’s circle fume that she’s not being adequately prepared or positioned, and instead is being sidelined,” CNN reported. “The vice president herself has told several confidants she feels constrained in what she’s able to do politically.”
The report said that the Biden administration has avoided dealing with Harris because they see “entrenched dysfunction and lack of focus” from her. The report said that even her defenders in the administration pass around a satire article mocking her over her lack of substantive work achievements.
“She’s perceived to be in such a weak position that top Democrats in and outside of Washington have begun to speculate privately, asking each other why the White House has allowed her to become so hobbled in the public consciousness, at least as they see it,” the report said. “Republicans and right-wing media turned Harris into a political target from the moment she was picked for the ticket. And implicit racism and sexism have been constant.”
The report said that sources that CNN spoke to claimed that it was Harris’ staff that was failing her and that Harris was “overly cautious.”
“When Biden picked Harris as his running mate, he was essentially anointing her as the future of the Democratic Party,” the report said. “Now many of those close to her feel like he’s shirking his political duties to promote her, and essentially setting her up to fail. Her fans are panicked, watching her poll numbers sink even lower than Biden’s, worrying that even the base Democratic vote is starting to give up on her.”
The report pointed out how the Biden administration sprang into action to defend Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg last month after he was called out for taking paternity leave amid the supply chain crisis.
A former Harris staffer, who spoke to current aides and Harris allies, said, “It’s hard to miss the specific energy that the White House brings to defend a white man, knowing that Kamala Harris has spent almost a year taking a lot of the hits that the West Wing didn’t want to take themselves.”
The report said that Harris did not want tough assignments that she believed were doomed to fail, like trying to solve the crisis on the U.S. southern border, which has worsened significantly under Biden:
Harris’ team was mad Biden had assigned her to handle diplomatic relations with the Northern Triangle nations, in hopes of addressing the root causes of migration to the US, but gave her no role on the southern border itself. That become the most visible crisis in the early days of Biden’s presidency as unaccompanied minors overwhelmed federal government resources. It seemed like an all-around politically losing assignment even though Biden had seen it as a sign of respect because it was the same job Obama had given him as vice president.
As CNN has previously reported, Harris herself has said she didn’t want to be assigned to manage the border, aware that it was a no-win political situation that would only sandbag her in the future. But Biden’s team was annoyed that Harris fumbled answers about the border, including when she gave an awkward, laughing response about not visiting it during a spring interview with NBC’s Lester Holt. As some around Harris see it, the White House failed to come to her defense.
The report added that Harris, whose approval rating sits at an abysmal 27.8%, has complained that she is not getting the support she wants.