Kamala Harris Doing Interview With Tim Walz Mocked by Ex-Bush Official

A former adviser to George W. Bush told CNN that Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris was “weak sauce” for doing her first media interview since Joe Biden endorsed her in July alongside her running mate Tim Walz.
Harris and Walz are being interviewed together on CNN on Thursday. Harris has not done an interview or press conference since Joe Biden ended his reelection bid and endorsed her on July 21.
Scott Jennings, a CNN contributor and conservative political strategist who served in the George W. Bush administration mocked her for choosing to bring Walz to her first interview after the pair were formally nominated at last week’s Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
“I do think people are going to bring that up. I have great confidence in Dana [Bash, who will be hosting the interview] and CNN to do this,” he said. “I think it’s incredibly weak, weak sauce, to show up with your running mate.
“The fact that they [Harris’ campaign staff] don’t have enough confidence in her to let her sit herself, the actual top of the ticket and do a single interview. In fact, I think the hand wringing and the gyrations over this over the last month show a troubling lack of confidence in her political ability, which also makes you wonder as a voter ‘what kind of president would you be if this kind of a small time decision, can we do an interview or not, what does that look like for your decision making process?’
“So yes, I think Republicans are going to think it’s pretty weak to show up with effectively someone to take up half the time.”
Jennings posted the CNN clip on his X account on Tuesday night, which was viewed over 700,000 times by Wednesday morning. Some commenters accused Jennings of hypocrisy because he did not accuse Donald Trump of being weak when he did a joint interview with JD Vance in July.
Less than a week after Trump announced Vance as his running mate, the pair were jointly interviewed on Fox’s Jesse Watters Primetime. Jennings did not comment on this interview at the time.
Harris has faced mounting criticism for not conducting any interviews since Biden, the winner of the Democratic primary, ended his reelection bid in July.
Trump’s campaign has been keeping a count of the number of days since Harris talked to the media. The Republican candidate and Vance have also mentioned it in their rally speeches.
Trump’s campaign has called it out on X, formerly Twitter, saying it is so that Harris’ “handlers have time to play damage control.”
Newsweek has contacted Scott Jennings and Harris’ campaign via email for comment.