Why is Kamala Harris bringing Tim Walz to her first big interview?

Three weeks ago, just days after being formally chosen as the Democratic presidential candidate, Kamala Harris was pressed about her plans for a sit-down interview.

“I talked to my team,” he told reporters on the airport tarmac in Detroit. “I want to have an interview scheduled before the end of the month.”

On Thursday night, Ms. Harris will — barely — make good on that promise, sitting down with CNN’s Dana Bash for her first big interview.

But Ms. Harris won’t be there alone. The vice president will be joined by his running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, for the prime-time appearance, airing at 9pm EDT (02:00 BST).

The interview answers weeks of questions about where and when Ms. Harris will hold an in-depth, substantive discussion of her candidacy and agenda — standard procedure for all major party presidential candidates.

But with Mr. Walz in tow, the appearance may also fuel growing criticism that, after escaping the rigors of a months-long presidential primary, she has now escaped the scrutiny that comes with a solo interview.

Joint interviews with both members of a presidential ticket are not unusual.

Barack Obama and Joe Biden sat down for an interview with 60 minutes after Mr. Biden was chosen as the vice presidential candidate in 2008. Eight years later, Hillary Clinton and his partner Tim Kaine did the same. For Ms. Harris and Mr. Biden in 2020, they chose ABC 20/20. And less than a week after Trump announced JD Vance as his running mate, the pair were interviewed together on Fox.

But since Joe Biden passed the torch late last month, Ms. Harris has limited most of her engagement with the press to scripted, highly controlled environments. His last formal interview was on June 24, more than two months and a political life ago.

Her occasional interactions with reporters — brief responses to shouted questions on her way to and from campaign events — have done little to undercut Republican claims that she’s missing every opportunity to set her record and the agenda under the microscope.

The harshest criticism comes from his opponents, Donald Trump and JD Vance, who have given several interviews in the past month.

“He’s not smart enough to hold a press conference,” Mr. Trump told the media earlier in August. “I won’t do interviews with friendly people because I can’t do better than Biden.”

Ms. Harris’ apparent reluctance to sit down for questions has fueled the Republican narrative that the Harris-Walz campaign lacks substance.

“I think it’s incredibly weak, weak sauce, to run with your running mate,” Scott Jennings, a former special assistant to President George W. Bush, said on CNN this week, adding that Harris had a “lack of of troubling confidence’ in his own political ability.

The Democratic candidate has enjoyed a surge in momentum since entering the race. Now, after his turbulent introduction to American voters, he needs to “boost” that energy, said Republican strategist and Trump critic Chip Felkel.

“I have to get out of here,” he said. “He has to show that he can think under pressure, because that’s part of what the president has to do.”

But Ms Harris’ supporters insist that, given the dizzying nature of her candidacy, she is taking things at a smart pace.

“I think the cadence has been right,” said Peter Giangreco, a Chicago-based Democratic strategist. “Win the nomination, choose your candidate, present your economic plan, do your convention and now do some sit-ins and amplify that.”

Mr. Giangreco expected Ms. Harris and Mr. Walz to focus on his economic plan, an agenda to lower the cost of living and provide economic security that he first announced at a rally in Raleigh, North Carolina two weeks ago. to do.

With this particular message, the presence of Mr. Walz during this week’s interview can be useful. The Minnesota governor won praise from liberals for his economic record while in office, including hundreds of millions in tax credits to families and universal free school lunches.

Mr. Giangreco also pointed to another potential benefit of a joint interview: drawing a contrast between Mr. Walz and his Republican counterpart Mr. Vance.

Since Mr Vance joined Mr Trump’s ticket in July, the Ohio senator has stumbled repeatedly, forced to defend past comments such as his derision of “cat women without children”.

However, the true impact of Ms. Harris and Mr. Walz will not be known until it is done.

Ms. Harris’s record with high-pressure interviews is mixed. A 2021 interview with NBC’s Lester Holt, in which he brushed off questions about his role in the administration’s border policy, was widely considered a failure.

But a more recent appearance, a one-on-one with CNN’s Anderson Cooper, in which she defended Mr. Biden’s calamitous debate, Ms. Harris seemed calm and confident amid a political storm.

If this upcoming CNN appearance is any comparison, most of the criticism will fall, said Mr. Felkel, the Republican strategist.

“They (the campaign) just need to be able to say ‘see, we said it,'” he said. “And then keep moving.”