Former Vice President Joe Biden selected as his nominee the former rival who delivered the most cutting attack of the 2020 nominating process – a fellow member of the Senate ‘club’ who accused him of working on segregationists and opposing school bussing.
It was a dramatic moment it did not take the Trump campaign long to recall. Team Trump blasted out a web video shortly after her selection calling Harris a ‘phony’ and ‘attacking Joe Biden for racist policies.’
It also sought to cast her as part of the ‘radical left,’ although one reason Biden may have selected Harris is her record as a former California attorney general, potentially blunting attacks on any nominee.
President Donald Trump’s campaign is already seeking to make hay out of angry clashes between former Vice President Joe Biden and his VP selection Sen. Kamala Harris
The video flashed an image of Harris’ performance in a a debate, where Harris knocked Biden back with her attack.
‘Meet phony Kamala Harris!’ the Trump campaign wrote in a tweet containing the video.
A Trump campaign text called her ‘Phony Kamala,’ using her first name only, an indication that may be the insult Trump seeks to brand her with.
On the debate stage, Harris accused Biden of ‘working with segregationists’ and told him: ‘had those segregationists their way, I would not be a member of the United States Senate,’ she told him.
Harris brought some of the sharpest attacks against Biden during debates, but her campaign ultimately fell apart
Joe Biden on Tuesday called Harris ‘a fearless fighter for the little guy, and one of the country’s finest public servants’
Vice President Joe Biden administers the Senate oath of office to Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., as her husband Douglas Emhoff, holds the Bible during a a mock swearing in ceremony in the Old Senate Chamber on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 3, 2017, as the 115th Congress begins
Harris called out Biden for ‘working with segregationists.’ He is seen here with former Dixiecrat Party nominee Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-S.C.)
The notes of Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden reference Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., among other things as he speaks at a campaign event at the William “Hicks” Anderson Community Center in Wilmington, Del., Tuesday, July 28, 2020. The notes called her ‘respected’ and a ‘great help to the campaign’
At another debate, she accused Biden of opposing bussing, although he denied it.
‘There was a little girl in California who was part of the second class to integrate her public schools, and she was bused to school every day, and that little girl was me,’ Harris said.
She added: ‘I will tell you that on this subject, it cannot be an intellectual debate among Democrats. We have to take it seriously. We have to act swiftly.’
Harris followed up by posting an image of herself as a girl when she was bussed to school.
Biden shot back at Harris for her time as a California prosecutor.
‘I did not praise racists,’ he told her. ‘If we want to have this litigated on who supports civil rights, I’m happy to do that,’ he added. ‘I was a public defender. I was not a prosecutor.’
He has also stood by his pledge to work with Republicans, and defended efforts to work with those he disagreed with in his own party during his decades-long Senate career.
Biden’s decision to select Harris over several other women indicates he has buried the hatchet. Online Tuesday he called her ‘a fearless fighter for the little guy, and one of the country’s finest public servants.’
He also lauded her for working with his late son, Beau, who served as the attorney general for Delaware.
‘Back when Kamala was Attorney General, she worked closely with Beau. I watched as they took on the big banks, lifted up working people, and protected women and kids from abuse. I was proud then, and I’m proud now to have her as my partner in this campaign,’ Biden said.
Biden had earlier held up ‘civility’ and spoken about his time working with people he disagreed with like Democratic segregationists in the Senate. Harris called the remark ‘hurtful.’
Biden admitted he was thrown off by the harsh attack after Harris first launched it.
”Sure they were going to come after me. I was prepared for them to come after me, but I wasn’t prepared for the person coming at me the way she came at me,’ Biden told CNN of the debate confrontation. ‘She knows me,’ he told CNN afterward.
‘I get all this information about other people’s past and what they’ve done and not done. I’m not going to go there,’ he said.
The Trump video accuses Biden of ‘handing the reins to Kamala while they jointly embrace the radical left,’ a sign Trump plans to hammer both of his rivals.
But may be Harris’ own prosecutorial chops that most drew Biden to her. As his running mate, she is likely spend considerable time attacking Trump, who Biden himself has accused of stoking racism.