Media veteran Chuck Todd slammed Vice President Kamala Harris over her campaign’s hesitation to give interviews.
Todd, who works as NBC’s chief political analyst, wrote a column Wednesday in response to Harris’ announcement of her first interview as the Democratic Party nominee for president. The interview will air Thursday night on CNN.
“Let me start with the first big mistake of the Harris campaign since she took over as the Democratic nominee,” Todd wrote. “It has now raised the stakes for her first one or two sit-down interviews, the first scheduled for Thursday with CNN. More words and phrases will get scrutinized simply because the campaign and the candidate are behaving as if doing these interviews is about as interesting to them as a visit to the dentist’s office.”
Harris was made the Democratic Party nominee after President Joe Biden ended his re-election campaign in July. She has not released a policy platform on her campaign website.
Todd, the former moderator of NBC’s Meet the Press, credited former President Donald Trump for his willingness to conduct interviews.
“I know many Democrats have an allergy to all things Trump, but the one thing I thought more candidates would learn from his initial campaign in 2016 is that he viewed all media as good for him, whether he thought the interviewer was a friendly, a neutral or an opponent,” he wrote. “Trump was willing to go everywhere.”
Todd continued to argue that Harris should conduct a series of interviews to lower the stakes. He suggested an interview with Fox News could provide an opportunity to show the vice president can handle confrontation ahead of her debates with Trump.
“The Harris campaign is acting as if it has something to fear,” he wrote. “I think the same mindset holds for the debate over debates. If you worry too much about a single confrontation, you’ve served only to raise the stakes for your own performance in said debate. But if you’re willing to do three or four or 10 debates, you’ve most likely diluted the impact of any one debate over another.”
Harris holds a slight lead against Trump in national polls, but battleground state polling shows a toss-up election, according to RealClearPolitics.
Todd wrote that Harris needs to prove her ability to handle high-pressure moments.
“Part of the job of being president is thinking on your feet when time is of the essence,” he wrote. “Sure, a media interview isn’t the presidency, but as the public tries to figure out the mettle of these presidential candidates, how they conduct themselves in both friendly and unfriendly media environments certainly helps.”