The gloves are off in Biden world after former Vice President Kamala Harris released an excerpt from her new memoir, calling it ‘recklessness’ to let the octogenarian decide for himself whether to run for re-election.
‘The stakes were simply too high,’ Harris writes in her forthcoming memoir, in an excerpt published by The Atlantic on Wednesday morning.
‘This wasn’t a choice that should have been left to an individual’s ego, an individual’s ambition. It should have been more than a personal decision.’
Her critique has infuriated at least some Biden insiders, one of whom called it a ‘sloppy, sort of craven, relatively unsophisticated attempt at deflecting blame’ for her loss.
Another who shared their unfiltered thoughts with the Daily Mail after reading the excerpt, unloaded on Harris for her ‘whining’ rewrite of her failed presidential bid.
The source took shots at not only her but the staff she surrounded herself with as vice president and in her abbreviated run for the White House in 2024.
‘Blaming the good (president’s) team because your team was s****y at getting you good press, or positioning you to succeed, doesn’t feel like a winning strategy or an effective comeback narrative, if you’re the former vice president,’ the insider said.
‘You had a team. It was their job to do the thing that you’re blaming the Biden team for. That’s crazy.’
Kamala Harris’ new book, 107 Days, out September 23, delivers a damning verdict on what she calls former President Biden’s ‘reckless’ refusal to bow out of the 2024 race sooner
Biden’s camp has spoken out about her critiques, telling Daily Mail that the book is a way to deflect blame for her loss to President Trump
In Harris’s 107 Days, which goes on sale on September 23, she revealed she regretted not pushing Biden to abandon his 2024 campaign sooner.
‘During all those months of growing panic, should I have told Joe to consider not running? Perhaps,’ Harris admits.
At one point, Harris gripes in the book that Biden waited 11 minutes into his withdrawal speech before even mentioning her name
‘Of all the people in the White House, I was in the worst position to make the case that he should drop out. I knew it would come off to him as incredibly self-serving if I advised him not to run. He would see it as naked ambition, perhaps as poisonous disloyalty.’
She says that going into the 2024 campaign, she automatically followed the ‘mantra’ set by the White House that it was Biden’s decision to make with his family if he wanted to run for re-election.
‘Was it grace, or was it recklessness?’ Harris asked. ‘In retrospect, I think it was recklessness.’
She complained that during the president’s speech announcing his decision to abandon his reelection campaign, he did not mention her name until ‘almost nine minutes into the 11-minute address.’
Her remarks were fighting words for those who fought for Biden.
A Biden White House official balked at her claim that the White House press team was weak in defending her when she faced criticism as vice president, including reports of high staff turnover in her office.
Insiders from Biden’s camp were outraged by Harris’ stance against the former president, saying it was not only her but the staff around her that contributed to her failure in the 2024 run for the White House
The official also took issue with Harris’ claim that she became more popular than the president, stating that polling showed Biden’s approval ratings were higher even during low points of his presidency, when he struggled with the botched Afghanistan withdrawal, COVID response and rising inflation.
The former vice president also revealed a list of grievances with Biden and his staff.
The source countered that the Biden administration spent a great deal of time and effort defending and advocating for her, on the record, in briefings and press interviews.
However, the White House source said there was no disputing the fact that there was exceptionally high turnover under Harris when she was vice president, during her 2020 campaign and her time as attorney general in California.
‘Vice President Biden didn’t seem to have any trouble positioning himself well, having a high approval rating, getting good press when he was vice president, surrounded by a good team,’ the source continued.
‘So her writing a book whining that the talented people in the building didn’t help her enough because she hired not-talented people seems as out of touch as one can get.’
The insider said they’re not certain whether Biden has read the manuscript, but said he and Jill Biden would recognize the politics involved.
‘I’d expect if you asked him today, he would sort of shake his head and say she’s doing what she feels she has to do to keep herself politically viable,’ the insider said.
The source added that Harris has only herself and her handpicked team to blame for the loss – citing blunders like backing gender-affirming care for prisoners, then failing to defend the stance when Trump inevitably attacked
But the source questioned the stance Biden’s number 2 has taken, calling it insane for her to suggest she could have won if Biden bowed out sooner.
‘The sort of irony in that is the assumption that she thinks she would have won a democratic primary had President Biden not anointed her the nominee,’ the source told the Daily Mail.
‘She wouldn’t have. She would have lost. Someone more talented than her would have beat her in the democratic primary.
‘The only reason she was the nominee in the first place is because of the guy that she’s out there attacking today,’ the insider continued.
The source also said Harris has only herself and her self-selected team to blame for the loss, pointing to such political malfeasance as to advocate gender-affirming care for prisoners, then failing to address it when Trump predictably attacked her for the position.
‘The ad that permeated the most for Trump, which was the most effective piece of paid media, it was that,’ the source said.
‘It was her on tape advocating for gender-affirming care for prisoners. And somehow the new people in charge, like David Plouffe and Stephanie Cutter, never did anything about it.
‘Head that s**t off,’ the insider continued. ‘It wasn’t Joe Biden who advocated for gender-affirming care for prisoners and then failed to address it on the campaign trail. That’s on her.’
A promotional tour posted for Kamala Harris’ book, which will be hitting major metropolitan cities such as New York, Los Angeles and Chicago
The source also didn’t mince words when asked for a reaction by others in Biden’s orbit.
‘People sort of see it as a sloppy, sort of craven, relatively unsophisticated attempt at trying to deflect blame and start whatever political comeback she thinks she has,’ the insider told the Daily Mail.
‘But if she was serious about it, she should be running for governor of California.
‘You know what’s not going to happen?’ the source continued. ‘You’re not going to write a book, go on The View and Seth Myers (talk show), blame the only guy that elevated you to the national level when he chose you as his running mate in August 2020, and think that’s going to position you to go beat (Illinois governor) J.D. Pritzker and (Senator) Raphael Warnock and (Biden transportation secretary) Pete Buttigieg in a primary.
‘That’s f***ing fantasy s**t.’
But the source said Harris obviously is trying to position herself for another act in politics.
‘Why would you go after the guy that was nothing but loyal to you and stood by your side and has a lot of personal affection for you?’ the insider said. ‘Why would you do that if you didn’t have some ultimate political objective in mind?»
At the same time, the insider said that in retrospect, Biden’s run for re-election might have been a mistake, while also defending the decision.
The insider also levelled another criticism against the former vice president, saying she had no leg to stand on for the upcoming democratic primaries against party heavyweights after she expressed blame against Biden on multiple talk shows like The View and Late Night with Seth Meyers
‘I think a lot of people have forgotten the complex political dynamics of the time,’ the source told the Daily Mail.
‘You just had the best midterm election for a sitting president in a generation, and he was passing wildly popular legislation and governing the country better than anyone had in decades and decades.
‘So there were lots of reasons to run, and it was a tough call, though everyone pretends like it wasn’t,’ the insider said.
‘Hindsight being 20-20, I think a lot of people, including President Biden, would probably say I probably shouldn’t have done it. But it’s bull**** for people to try to second-guess the decision in the moment given the factors we knew.’
