Questions Time

Harris will finally take questions:

Harris will sit for local interviews in battleground media markets, the memo indicated, and “will participate in an interview next week with the National Association of Black Journalists,” the Times reported: While Ms. Harris’s top aides are thrilled with her debate showing and Mr. Trump’s inability to push consistent and coherent attacks, they are looking to tweak their strategy only around the edges. The next steps, close advisers say, are ramping up her visibility on the campaign trail, including retail politicking in communities, increased press appearances, and putting herself in front of as many voters as possible in battleground states. Aides believe that at its heart, the race is unchanged. But Ms. Harris remains a key part of an unpopular incumbent administration in a nation where many voters say they want a decisive change and have expressed unhappiness with President Biden’s leadership. Her quandary was encapsulated in the debate’s very first question, when Ms. Harris was asked if she thought Americans were better off now than they were four years ago. Instead of giving a direct answer, she talked about her middle-class upbringing and her plans to help working families. It was almost as if she felt it would be unwise either to embrace Mr. Biden too closely or to obviously distance herself from him. The Harris campaign faces a conundrum: Harris cannot campaign on policies to fix crime, inflation, and border security without undermining the Biden-Harris administration’s policies, but she must tout the administration’s policies to validate her record and candidacy.

Damned if she does, damned if she doesn't...