WASHINGTON (TNND) — Former Vice President Kamala Harris lamented her running mate Tim Walz’s docile performance during the Vice President debate against now Vice President JD Vance, suggesting that at this level “you must be ready to brawl.”
Unlike Harris’ one-and-only debate against Trump, Walz and Vance’s debate was deemed cordial in the court of public opinion with very few clash ups and both opponents steering clear of personal attacks.
But in the eyes of Harris, who deemed Walz as the “closer” before the election, Walz fell short of her expectations, saying Vance had tricked him with his “mild-mannered aw-shucks” attitude.
“When Tim fell for it and started nodding and smiling at J.D.’s fake bipartisanship, I moaned to Doug, ‘What is happening?'” Harris wrote in her memoir 107 Days. “I told the television screen: ‘You’re not there to make friends with the guy who is attacking your running mate.’”
Harris said that Saturday Night Lives’ satirical depiction of her and her husband Doug Emhoff watching Vance’s debate performance was “uncanny.” However, unlike Maya Rudolph, Harris said she did not spit out her wine.
“Tim fell into a pattern of defending his record as a governor,” Harris wrote. “Then he fumbled his answer when the moderator, predictably, questioned why he had claimed to be in Hong Kong during the democracy protests in Tiananmen Square.”
“Tim had been on his way to teach in China that summer but hadn’t yet left the United States on the date of the massacre,” Harris continued. “Instead of simply stating that he’d gotten his dates mixed up, but that being in China during a period of human rights oppression had profoundly influenced him, he talked about biking in Nebraska.
Harris shared how Walz “felt bad” about his debate performance, but Harris told him that his performance had “a negligible effect” on their polling. However, Harris noted that Walz struggling with the “unfair” attacks on his records, and that it had taken a toll on his family.
“For the candidate, the family that is your source of strength can become your weakness in a presidential campaign,” Harris wrote.
” In choosing Tim, I thought that as a second-term governor and twelve-year congressman he would know what he was getting into,” Harris wrote. “In hindsight, how could anyone?”
Harris shared her decision to choose Walz was one she and her husband “went and forth” with. She mentioned that her senior staff “strongly favored Tim” and that her sister and brother-in-law also preferred him. But her husband, was leaning toward Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro.
“He had known Josh longer and leaned that way. It was always going to have to be my decision,” Harris wrote. “I told my staff and family that I didn’t want any more input, and I went to do something practical: I made a tasty rub and seasoned a pork roast. By the time I went to bed, I’d decided on Walz.”
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