Vice President Kamala Harris sat down with an ABC affiliate for her first solo interview Friday, choosing the same network that got her through this week’s slanted presidential debate — but still managed to stumble through softball questions.
She answered five questions from Action News 6 ABC, a local affiliate of ABC News, in the interview that came just days after the moderators in the ABC debate with Donald Trump assisted her by providing fact checks on the former president but not her.
One of the ABC moderators for the debate, Linsey Davis, is a member of Harris’ sorority and Dana Walden, a Disney executive whose portfolio includes ABC, is one of the vice president’s close friends.
Action News 6 ABC anchor Brian Taff asked Harris, 59, what she would specifically do to bring down prices as president.
“Well, I’ll start with this. I grew up as a middle class kid. My mother raised my sister and me. She worked very hard,” she began, before going on about her neighborhood where people “were proud of their lawn.”
“We as Americans have beautiful character. We have ambitions and aspirations and dreams. But not everyone necessarily has access to the resources that can help them fuel those dreams and ambitions,” Harris went on.
She did not say how she would bring prices down but did highlight her proposed policy to give a $25,000 handout to new homeowners and giving tax breaks to new small businesses.
Harris also said she is “obviously not Joe Biden” because she offers an “opportunity economy” and “a new generation of leadership.”
“So, for example, thinking about developing and creating an opportunity economy where it’s about investing in areas that really need a lot of work,” she said, seemingly looking to find words.
The veep said she was not going take “anyone’s guns away” and that she supports the Second Amendment, but will ban “assault weapons” and “universal background checks.”
“They’re literally tools of war,” Harris said.
On what she thinks Trump’s appeal is to voters, Harris again took a few sentences to get to the core of the question.
“I, uh, based on experience and, uh, and, a lived experience know in my heart, I know in my soul, I know that the vast majority of Americans have in common so much more than what separates us,” she said.
“And I also believe that I am accurate in knowing that most Americans want a leader who brings us together as Americans and not someone who professes to be a leader who is trying to have us point our fingers at each other,” she said of Trump, arguing voters want someone with “common sense.”
“I think people are more willing now in light of the hate and division that we see coming out of Donald Trump to say, ‘Hey, let’s put country first.’”
Taff finally asked Harris if there was anything she wanted voters to know about her.
“I don’t know. I mean, probably it’s not very different from anybody watching right now. I love my family, um, one of my favorite things that I lately have not been able to do is Sunday family dinner. I love to cook. I have incredible friends,” Harris said.
“I have a career that really, and I said it the other day, you know, as a career prosecutor, I never asked a victim of crime where they were a Republican or a Democrat. The only thing I ever asked them was, ‘Are you OK?’” she said, arguing she thinks most Americans want that approach.
Harris has avoided the press for the majority of her time as the Democratic nominee.
She did her first debate over a month after replacing President Biden, 81, in the race with CNN alongside her running mate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.
She then appeared on two local radio shows before debuting on the debate stage against Trump on Tuesday with ABC.
Harris has been criticized for not allowing the press more access to her campaign as the race dwindles down to less than two months before Election Day.