Kamala Harris on Kamala Harris
53:20 Share

This podcast is supported by FX's Fargo. From Emmy-nominated writer and director Noah Hawley, this anthology series follows as a Midwestern housewife attempts to evade her past. Starring Emmy-nominated lead actress in a limited series, Junot Temple, lead actor in a limited series, Jon Hamm, and supporting actor in a limited series, Lamorne Morris. Fargo is available for your consideration at fxnetworks.com slash FYC.

So, Democrats have their new presumptive nominee. And in the days since Kamala Harris stepped into this role, I've been going back through my own reporting. I've been covering Harris since early 2019, when I was the Times reporter assigned to her presidential run.

Last year, I wrote an in-depth article about her for the Times Magazine, examining some of the questions that have swirled around her in Washington. Like, what does she stand for? How does she make decisions? And was she only selected as Biden's running mate because of her race and gender? Today, as Americans are once again looking at Harris as their potential president, I wanted to listen back to two excerpts from conversations I had last year

To hear how the questions that felt so big then land now. One with a friend who knows Harris very well. And another with Harris herself. From the New York Times, I'm Astead Herndon. This is The Run-Up. When I think about my time covering Harris, the word that comes to mind is guarded. Not only can she be cautious as a candidate, but the people around her are often quite cautious as well, worried about offending her.

or getting ahead of her on a particular issue. I talked to more than 75 people for the magazine article. Childhood friends, former staffers, political allies, and people in senior positions in Biden's White House. But one voice stood out in particular, someone who knows Harris as a person and politician.

and helped reveal aspects of her that I think often go unseen. I'm going to take some notes, so if it looks like I'm not looking, it's just because I'm right now. It's okay. If it looks like I'm not looking, I'm thinking. Senator LaFonza Butler of California was a senior advisor on Harris' 2020 presidential campaign and remains one of her closest allies in Washington.

What was the process of deciding to run for president? And like, where were those opinions coming from? Who was the brain trust? I would say that the brain trust was diverse. It was staff diverse.

team colleagues who had been with her for a long time, colleagues who had just joined her in the Senate. It was people in her family. It was people who had been a part of her sort of campaigns. It was diverse in terms of its sort of ethnic makeup. And so I think that she was, it was a robust and serious process that took into consideration all of the things that people loved about her at the time, all of her positives,

and a very strong understanding of areas of vulnerability. What do people identify as those vulnerable areas at the time? Being a woman, being a Black woman, being from California.

being a prosecutor and all of the criticisms potentially associated with that. There were sort of all things that were obvious, but also maybe not as obvious on the table. When, you know, when you all kind of get into that process, I don't want to spend a ton of time on the presidential process,

There's a couple things about it I do think are important. One of it is like the kind of mixed messages nature of it. There was a lot of different slogans, a lot of different pushes. I think there was people coming out of that kind of confused on where she was trying to fall ideologically. When you look back at that time, was there a clarity of message, not necessarily to win, but to really define her on the national stage and make clear who she is and what she cares about? Did that campaign accomplish that goal?

No. I think a lot of the work that that campaign effort had to do was to introduce her to the rest of the country. And I think that she is her best friend.

and most effective sort of agent in that way. And who she is by way of words and/or slogans didn't always come through as clearly.

But I think the way in which she showed up and represented and introduced herself was incredibly strong and consistent. So in that way, I think she was very clear on who she was and how she would approach the leadership. I think the campaign messaging in terms of how you describe it was, I'm not as strong as she was. You know, one of the things I'm like,

Another piece of the campaign I'm interested in is how the issues were selected. The thing that surprised me was that criminal justice and the kind of prosecutor-ness was not front and center in that campaign. In a lot of ways, it seemed in the background. Why didn't we get a criminal justice plan? Why didn't we hear about her prosecutor story? And what pushed the campaign away from what had been a really consistent story she was telling for a long time? Yeah. I'm honestly not sure. I am not...

Sure. I think there were opinions. There was lots of conversation that never led to decision. And so when there was not decision, it was...

about the thing that she felt clearly that the country needed to hear, right? That she felt very clearly that the country needed to have a conversation about women and girls and public interest. Like she was very clear about those things. And so where there was not necessarily agreement amongst the folks to whom she spoke about that particular point,

It sort of, it was left undecided. So if I hear it right, a kind of tragedy, there were so many opinions about where to go on criminal justice that it never made a kind of decision. There was conversation, but there was not a decision to like figure out a lane to do that directly. I think that's fair. Okay. When the campaign ends, just like emotionally, personally, like how was it? Do you remember that day? Do you remember talking to her? Like,

I'm curious earnestly in how it felt. It came with people. For me, personally, I was there. Did I talk to her? Yeah, I talked to her. I was there. It was not an easy decision.

Just like getting in was not an easy decision. There was as much rigor put into the conversation of getting out as it was to decide to get in. She was so clear in terms of once making the decision that she was going to get out, in terms of how she wanted to handle the exit. In what way? The first thing that she said she wanted to do was she wanted to personally talk to the staff.

She wanted to personally talk to her donors. She is thoughtful about people, people as individuals and people who've invested in her and people who have done work on her behalf, people whose hopes and dreams that she knows, she carries. She's just incredibly thoughtful about that.

And so, yeah, it was difficult and she brought joy to a difficult time. You might remember there was like some, yeah, the line dance video. I think I remember. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It brought joy to what was emotionally hard for everyone who worked for her. And it's like what you might have thought was going to be like these really sad, somber times, like turned into like joyous parties in some kind and celebrations in a weird way. It was really all about joy.

soldiering through the difficulty of knowing that it was time for her to exit and the celebration of the work and belief that so many people had for her. It's like the two sides of her story

manifested in such a really, I think, supportive way. You mentioned the people whose hopes and dreams she carries. I want to ask a question about the entrance. Like, when you think of what's the biggest reason you think that the dial went to yes and says, I will run for president, it felt like that sentiment, the idea that there were people who, you know, showed her she stood on, who had not been in that position and that she needed, like, I felt like that was a big reason in that. Can you say something about the hopes and dreams piece of

of even like how she makes decisions and how much is that a part of her thinking when she's thinking about her next steps? Always. It is always a part of her thinking. And not only their hopes and dreams, but their fears in a lot of ways. It's like, I think she does think about all of the components of what others imbue in her. And I know that she thinks about

How can me doing this thing, whatever is the thing, running for DA, running for attorney general, running for Senate, how can I carry forward what people deserve and how we make it better for them in that role? That is real for her.

It is a real part of how she is like, what can I bring? What can I do? How does this position help me solve? Like those are real conversations and real questions that she puts in front of the entire group of people that's helping her think about it. Yeah, I mean, I do think you're identifying here is really interesting because what I hear from staff and folks around her is a belief that's not necessarily like,

incremental-ism, but it's like, how do I change these structures to help people? And how do I make that most possible? Because I know these structures don't change easily. And I feel like that's kind of what you're describing. That's exactly what the calculation is. I've been in conversations where that is...

It's always present. It is always about how can I make this system work? How does my presence, my skill set, my offering make this have the potential or possibility to make something better for the people that I know are counting on me to do that? Mm-hmm.

I mean, that's an interesting sense of duty that I feel like is both implicit in a lot of public service, but it's not how I would say a lot of politicians think about it. How much would you ascribe that to her role?

personal life, her background, lived experience? Should that be a way I think about maybe how women or people of color come to these roles? What do you think is informing that different lens that she comes to? Because that's a little distinct in the ways that other people come to it. Yeah. It's probably all of those things. Her experience. I mean, she talked about her friend who was abused. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

The fact that her sister was a teenage mom. The fact that she experienced D.C. as a college student at a time when D.C. was really tough. The fact that she grew up in Oakland and had this frame of reference of civil rights and being both inside activists and being around outside activists. I think it's...

All of those things, the fact that she's seen so much harm brought individually, but also systemically from being a prosecutor. And so I think all of that influenced her lived experience, her professional experience, her learning from regular people when she was traveling the country. I think all of it really does influence

inform how she shows up. Inform and reinforce. You know, I was focusing on those early periods with you. I have a couple VP questions. I'm kind of obsessed with this Joe Biden pledge to choose a woman and kind of like everything that happened after he made that pledge. Like, what did you think

not obviously the substance, but the public announcement. We're kind of in a stage of that. He said, I was going to choose a Black woman for the Supreme Court. I was going to choose a woman for vice president. When you heard that, what did you think of his decision to publicly announce it? And did you think when he said that, that's going to be Kamala Harris? I definitely hoped that it would be Kamala Harris. I think that there was all the reason why it could and should be Kamala Harris.

You know, when he made the announcement, I don't think that I thought anything of it at the time. Right. In a campaign context. And politicians say lots of things in campaign context. Were you involved in the kind of backroom organizing for her with the VP selection team? For a while. Yeah. Yeah.

When you were, what was your sense of what their criteria was and how did she end up meeting that? Is it the resume? Is it, it wasn't identity? Do you think they had space to choose a person who wasn't a Black woman? Not for Black people. I mean, look, I think the part of it in which I was engaged, I would say,

She was always on the list to be, you know, there's never a list that did not include her. And I think that there was an organized effort to make it clear to the administration or to those who were considering this decision.

to make it clear that the black community have been key to the president's advancement and he needed to be responsive to that community. And so I think she emerged as the strongest option given those realities. Okay, the last, I'm going to run a couple spicier ones by you. One thing I'm stuck on here is like the effect of the like consultant white donor ecosystem, you know, like it's

it strikes me that like, this is a kind of whispery network that develops among these kind of people who they decide that someone isn't good enough or that someone is whatever, whatever, kind of amongst themselves. And so that's the thing I kind of want to like,

call out here because she seems like someone who's been a real victim of that stuff. How difficult is it? And I'm not talking about Republicans and the character they build around that here. I'm talking about Democrats. I'm talking about liberals. I'm talking about white men. I'm talking about white women in the Democratic Party. How much is that what we're talking about here when we talk about things that she can't shake? Yeah. I think that it is... I mean, you hear what they say.

You hear what they say, right? I think it is as much... They've got to find a way to... You know, in order to push somebody up, they've got to tear somebody down. And I think you are...

saying and sort of calling out exactly, I think, what women generally and women of color in particular experience every day who are running for office. You know, the donor class find a way to make those arguments to reporters as well. And so, look, is she a victim in the establishment sort of getting together and deciding that she shouldn't be it? Sure. Yeah. And

Calling it out is probably the best thing that can be done. But it may not change. Mm-hmm. She leans into, she is authentically who she is. And yeah, that's not comfortable for those folks. Mm-hmm.

The last thing I would say is like about Black folks, you know, because the other people roasting the things like hip hop stuff aren't just, you know, kind of white donor class or even Republicans. But you definitely have a group of kind of like younger people of color who have kind of put a mean version of her out in the world. What do you think is the reason whereas like young people were coming to Obama so excitedly

It doesn't feel necessarily like just like a person to person difference. Maybe it's the time is different or something. But it does feel like in the ways that she's trying to bring together this coalition that like they're just not on fire in the same ways that they were in an earlier time. Like, what do we think that it seems like a taller task now? I think it is a taller task. I think voters are living in a lot of conditions that are different from when Obama ran it. Okay.

And the challenge continues to get harder, but she is continuing to engage young people, people of color, and engage the Democratic base, I think, in a way that is effective for what we know is going to be an incredibly tight race. Mm-hmm.

Do you think Democrats are underrating Trump and the possibility of that victory or possibility of a close race, as you mentioned? No, I don't think so. No. Okay. I don't think so. I mean, I think the ghost of 2016 is real, right? Like people remember what they felt like.

what it felt like when there may have been those who took the possibility of Trump winning for granted. And I think it is becoming more and more clear Democrats are remembering what election night 2016 felt like and know that they don't ever want to feel that way again. And to me, that is why we all need to be rallying behind this administration, this ticket right now.

So that there is clarity, there is unity, we have a sense of direction, and we're all fighting and rolling in the same direction. Is the replacing her talk disrespectful? Yeah.

Yeah, and it's also not uncommon. Like, you know, there were calls to replace Biden. Yeah. Yeah, and it's like, yeah, it's disrespectful, and it's not uncommon. I think the thing that is uncommon or that makes it that much more disrespectful is that we are calling on a historic vice president who has been a high-quality partner and also an asset to the country.

at a time where everything is at stake. And so it is, in my opinion, time for us as a party to respect what she has done, to respect what she brings, and to cut out the bullshit. You know, LaFazza, thank you so much. I really appreciate this. I mean, this is really helpful. I gave you a sense of the timeline, but basically, after turning in before the end of the line...

So when I talked to Butler last fall, Vice President Harris was a somewhat embattled figure, struggling to answer questions about whether she could lead the Democratic Party going forward. Now, we're in a completely different moment, and Harris seems to be adjusting to it. Issues like protecting abortion rights have clarified her message. Instead of running from her record as a prosecutor, she's now running for president.

She's now leaning into it. Even those memes that were once shared to mock her are now being shared in support. All of it adds up to the unity Butler was seeking, at least for now. The party has cut the bullshit. All it took was a crisis. Next up, Harris in her own words.

BP added more than $130 billion to the U.S. economy over the past two years by making investments from coast to coast. Investments like acquiring America's largest biogas producer, Arkea Energy, and starting up new infrastructure in the Gulf of Mexico. It's and, not or. See what doing both means for energy nationwide at bp.com slash investing in America.

I'm Julian Barnes. I'm an intelligence reporter at The New York Times. I try to find out what the U.S. government is keeping secret. Governments keep secrets for all kinds of reasons. They might be embarrassed by the information. They might think the public can't understand it. But we at The New York Times think that democracy works best when the public is informed.

It takes a lot of time to find people willing to talk about those secrets. Many people with information have a certain agenda or have a certain angle, and that's why it requires talking to a lot of people to make sure that we're not misled and that we give a complete story to our readers. If The New York Times was not reporting these stories, some of them might never come to light. If you want to support this kind of work, you can do that by subscribing to The New York Times.

Are you doing? Good, how are you? Good, doing well. Thank you. I appreciate you taking some time out. Wow. We're like on a talk show. After spending months talking to people around Harris, I wanted to talk with her directly. So I went to Chicago to hear her speak at an event about gun violence. And I sat down with her after for a one-on-one conversation. I guess my first question is just expectations to reality. Like, how is the job? And do you like being vice president? I...

Love my job because of moments like this. Not this interview, but just, you know, don't be confused. But because of moments like why we're here in Chicago today, right? 2018.

leaders, many are mothers who lost a child to gun violence. We've already aired this interview back in November. But in this moment, I think it's important to go back to selections from the conversation to understand the gulf between how people talk about Harris and how she speaks about herself. One of the things I wanted to understand was how her early life in the Bay Area and her time at Howard University shaped her career choices.

One of the things that sticks out about Howard or Berkeley is it also produces kind of radical politics, people who are trying to upend systems often. It seems like you made the kind of conscious choice early to be someone who wants to work within the system to find change. How did you see that as your role? And specifically, how did you come to the decision as a prosecutor to make change happen? I'm going to challenge your definition of radical. Okay.

Radical, from my perspective, has often been a word used with people who understand that the system and the status quo can and must be changed. And in that way, understand that, for example, as I did, that to become a prosecutor was to go inside of the system and attempt to improve it from inside. Some would call that a radical approach.

to tradition, which is to say that tradition should be, we should challenge whether traditional approaches have actually been effective in achieving the intended goal, which in this case is community safety.

You saw it. You saw going into that office as a prosecutor, as a radical choice. I didn't use the term radical, but I certainly understood that it was a very conscious decision. There's no question about that. And I made it for a number of reasons. I mean, one of the reasons to be candid, I don't talk about it very often, is one of my best friends in high school I learned was being molested by her stepfather.

And when I realized that was happening, I said to her, you got to come live with us. I called my mother and said, you know, mommy, this is how she said, yes, she needs to come live with us. And she did. And a lot of that experience and seeing what that was for her and coupled with, I guess, a very real instinct of mine always, which has been to try to protect people.

I also became a prosecutor and specialized in crimes against women and children. And I specialized for a long time in child sexual assault cases for that reason. So there were many reasons that I chose to become a prosecutor, including challenging the notion that you can't work to change systems from the inside. There's an approach that I have always taken. I said it here in Chicago. There's the inside-outside game.

And there's a role for everyone everywhere. I will tell you this, and maybe it's a radical notion. I have never believed that I don't belong somewhere. And I was raised to believe that I belong anywhere that I choose to go. And so that might be a radical notion, especially given... Where does that kind of self-confidence even early come from? My community, my family, everything, everything.

kind of message that I received, especially growing up, was you can be and do anything. I guess kind of just to make the point clear, though, why not a public defender? Why not other ways to use legal advocacy? I wanted to, I believed that there should be, that we who believe that change and reform should happen have to be inside as well as on the outside. I felt very strongly about that. In California. Because here's the thing. Go ahead.

Being on the inside, you don't have to ask anybody permission. I didn't have to ask anybody permission when I created one of the first reentry initiatives in the United States and said, I'm going to focus on first-time, low-level drug sales offenders and get them jobs and counseling. And if they are parent, parenting classes. I didn't have to ask anybody permission. Sometimes I'm not so good asking for permission. Right.

In California, there's often the distinction not between DNR, but just between Democrats themselves. You know, we use terms like liberal, progressive, all of those things. When you were coming up kind of in that world, California politics, how did you see yourself? How did you define your own politics? I think it depends on who you're talking to in terms of how they use the word. So I have... Why don't you define each one for me, and then I can tell you where I fit. If you want to say, for example...

that believing that working people should receive a fair wage and be treated with dignity and that there is dignity in all work, well, then I don't know what label do you give that one. If you believe that parents should have affordable childcare, I'm not sure what the label is for that. If you believe that as we have just accomplished, seniors should be able to not have to go into medical debt to fill a prescription for insulin and it should be capped at $35 a month, I don't

I don't know what that label is. If you believe that we need to focus on an issue like maternal mortality and recognize how race and socioeconomic status can play a role in that.

What's that label? Right. I guess often the labels used as kind of proxies for kind of root cause conversations. You know, maybe progressives believe that, you know, kind of structural inequality is such that it has to be upended. Liberals are thinking more about working within system or something like that. I'm saying when you think about kind of the root cause of why issues are the way that they are, what do you point back to?

Well, name the issue and then I'll tell you. There's no monolith. Name the issue. Inequality. Economic inequality. Economic inequality. Well, then you'd have to look at, for example, a variety of issues. You can look at, let's just take the African-American experience from slavery on.

And we don't have to even go back that far to understand where the inequality came from. There were no 40 acres and a mule, by the way. You look at redlining. You look at what happened in terms of, for example, the Tulsa riots. You look at Black Wall Street. You look at what happened in terms of the GI Bill.

when there was a boost by the federal government to invest in mostly men, but returning from battle, from war, and an intent to build a middle class around those extraordinary people who sacrificed so much and how black folks were excluded. So economic inequality there? Well, there were issues that were about policy and practice that excluded purposely people based on their race. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

But one of the quotes I most remember from your presidential run was you saying when asked what you believe in that you weren't trying to restructure society. How do you solve those kind of deep systemic inequalities that you're laying out without restructure? Do you know what I'm saying? Well, I think you have to be more specific because I'm not really into labels in terms of that kind of approach. I think that, okay, so let's break down. Let's actually deconstruct the points you're making. Okay.

What do we need to do to address something like economic inequality in terms of access to capital? Okay. Okay? That's a big issue. If you come from a community that does not have, for a variety of reasons that we, again, just spoke of one, that does not have intergenerational wealth, but you are someone who is an entrepreneur and has a really good idea but no access to capital,

But your idea is great and you are hardworking and you have a good plan. The work that I have been doing for many years is increasing access to capital for women and minority and rural businesses, understanding that they're not going to get the kind of

opportunity from a big bank because a big bank doesn't necessarily understand the mores or the capacity or the needs or dreams of a community to invest in a small business in that community. So there are specific ways that we go about doing it. I got you.

I guess one of the ways I want to sit with this kind of question is in criminal justice, where you spent a lot of your career. You know, I reread smart on crime a couple months ago. How would you kind of define that? And then, you know, what's a phrase really associated with your rise and kind of associated with your brand of how you view criminal justice? What does smart on crime mean? I came up with the phrase. What does smart on crime mean?

It means I proposed it by saying that for too long on criminal justice policy, we've offered a false choice, which suggests you're either soft on crime or you're tough on crime. And instead, I proposed we should ask, are we smart on crime? And in asking that question, measure our effectiveness similar to how the private sector, for example, does. The private sector will often be quite unburdened by ideology.

When asking of its productivity, what is the return on the investment? Right. ROI. So the smart on crime philosophy was about let's ask, what is the return on our investment? We're putting extraordinary amounts of money into a criminal justice system that is mostly focused on reaction and not prevention.

But empirical evidence and anecdotal evidence for sure tells us that it's actually a greater return on our investment to focus on prevention instead of reaction. Focusing on what we need to do around workforce development, mental health treatment, supporting working families versus anywhere from $35,000 to $100,000 a year to incarcerate someone. Right? Right.

So that's what the smart on crime philosophy is about. When you think about when you wrote that and kind of branded that versus how we talk about criminal justice now, it does seem a little different, both in terms of policies that you've come around to embrace. It was almost 20 years ago. Certainly. Very different. I guess I'm asking when you think about what changed from then to now, is there anything you look back and say, I wish we did differently? You have to be more specific. As a prosecutor. Yeah.

I'm thinking through the lens of trying to create justice, which I feel like you have outlined as the reason you got in that role. And to create justice in the criminal justice system, for me, included how to achieve a goal that we all have, which is to allow people to be safe, right? And be free from fear. Yeah. Yeah.

When you look back at the policies both as AG and DA, do you see policies like the truancy program as something that lines up with that belief in retrospect? Well, here's the thing about... I maintain a very strong feeling that we have to focus on the needs of families to support them in raising their children. And we have to...

Right.

or don't care about their children as much as other parents, when in fact the issue is they simply may not have the resources to do the things that need to happen to fully, um,

Right.

Because the reality is that if they can't afford to go to work and to send their children to daycare, the quality of their life overall and the projections for the future of that child's life are much lower than had they the ability to afford child care and be able to go to work. So this is the connection between these issues. And I think that when we judge public policy, we should always think about

the actual effect and impact on people. And that's certainly how I have done my work. You know, my work, for the most part, has been the work almost my entire career of making decisions that have a direct impact on people's lives. There were only a few years, the four years I was in the U.S. Senate, that I was in a legislative body.

But my career, for the most part, has not been one of being focused on giving lovely speeches or trying to pass a bill. It's been about making decisions that literally are about life and death, or about whether somebody maintains their liberty or not. Decisions that could move markets. As Attorney General of California, representing the fourth or fifth, depending on which year, largest economy in the world, being the chief law enforcement officer and the chief

Chief lawyer to protect consumer rights. My words could literally move markets.

And so that's how I approach public policy. I'm probably oriented to think about what does this actually mean as opposed to how does this just sound? I want to get to like kind of now. But first, in 2016, when you were elected to the Senate the same day Donald Trump was elected to the White House, I remember the stories at the time kind of instantly painting you as a presidential candidate, as quote unquote female Obama, a thing that kind of rang around you for kind of years.

I also saw some clip when Gwen Ifill referred to you as this even back in 2009. I've heard some people say that that was kind of a difficult moniker to be put on you. I'm curious what you thought about that moniker and how it loomed over you, even growing to the point of running for president and eventually becoming vice president.

I didn't think much of it. I mean, I love Gwen Ifill. I loved her. And she and I spent a lot of time together. And I have no question in my mind that she meant it as a compliment. But I didn't think of it much beyond that. In 2020, obviously, Biden was making his selection for running May. And I was reading stories at that time that was basically saying very clearly, you know, the Times story, Harry Reid says...

that he came to the decision that he needed to choose a black woman. While that is obviously about you, that's not necessarily you personally, but your identity. How should it matter? Does it matter that that narrative has existed that Biden needed to choose someone who was a black person? And should it matter?

I don't think I understand your question. I'm saying, does it matter that that kind of narrative around Biden needed to choose a black woman as a running mate still exists and has hovered over that selection? It happened. I don't think I understand you. I honestly don't understand your question. I'm saying, did that put you in a difficult... Has it lingered? Yeah, did that put... He chose a black woman. That woman is me. So I don't know that anything lingers about what he should choose. He has chosen. He asked me to join him on the ticket. Mm-hmm.

I guess I was, I can move on. I want to ask something more about the issues that are in your portfolio then. One of the questions, one that we've been focusing on root causes at the border, there's been more than $4 billion put into border policy, but that's not, you know, when we think of 2024, it's much more short term. Hold on, the,

$4 billion. Are you referring to my initiative? Yeah, that's not been put into the border. That has been put into root causes. Yes, I'm saying, but when you think of the political issue of immigration, it's much more focused on short-term. I'm saying, what is your answer to what has the administration done to short-term secure border security and at the same time balance that with the priority of being open and welcoming to immigrants? Okay, so let's start with the work that I've done. And the work that I've done has been to focus on the root cause issue. So not the border issue, but...

Why is it that people are leaving and to address those issues? And I come at that from the following perspective. Most people don't want to leave home. Most people do not want to leave home. They don't want to leave the place where they were raised. They don't want to leave their grandmother. They don't want to leave the church where they grew up in. They don't want to leave their community or their friends.

And when they do leave, it usually is one of two things. They are fleeing harm or they simply cannot satisfy the basic needs of themselves or their family if they stay. So my work addressing root causes has been informed by that perspective. And so the work I have done is to create and to work on a public-private partnership with

where I have been working with the private sector to invest resources in particular the three main countries that are in the northern part of Central America to address the root causes. And we have raised over $4.2 billion.

dealing with issues like what we can do to support agriculture, which is a main facet of the economy of a lot of these countries. Our administration has been very clear. We need a safe, secure, and humane system of immigration. The bottom line is we need Congress to act. Congress must pass immigration reform. It is irresponsible to

that we have over 10 million people in the country, some of whom have been here for decades, who are living a life where they are productive and they are paying taxes.

and there's no movement from Congress. It's a shame that it has become so partisan. There was a time when President Bush was advocating for it, when John McCain was advocating for it, and now we're in a place where the rhetoric around it has been to vilify and attempt to dehumanize

Yeah. I get the roadblocks in Congress and I get your kind of root cause work in the long term. I'm saying if you're a voter in the short term who is saying, is our border secure? And what is this administration's answer to that? What's that answer? The answer is that we are absolutely safe.

making it secure and putting resources into it to do that work. Another thing you've been focused on is voting rights. And President Biden made really explicit promises to Black communities as he, you know, rose to the nomination on voting rights, on criminal justice reform, two things that have not been able to come to fruition. You know, when we ask about kind of promises made, promises kept to Black communities, it's often pointed to, you know,

individuals in high places, representation. I'm asking, has that promise made to black communities been kept? So in the two and a half years that we have been in office, I am proud that we have achieved a number of accomplishments that have benefited all people in America and have benefited black Americans in particular. As a proud graduate of an HBCU, the fact that we have invested, I think, almost $6 billion in our HBCUs is an extraordinary achievement.

will have extraordinary impact given that our HBCUs are centers of academic excellence.

The work that we have done, for example, that I've been doing on increasing access to capital, a lot of that has benefited and been focused on black small businesses and Latino small businesses and native small businesses and rural small businesses. The work that we have done bringing down the cost of insulin and capping it at $35 a month, black Americans are 60% more likely to be diagnosed with diabetes than others.

Us capping the cost of insulin at $35 a month is very significant for a lot of people. Latinos are 70% more likely to be diagnosed with diabetes. When you look at the work that we have done that has been about addressing what we need to do around police reform and banning chokeholds and no-knock warrants for federal law enforcement, there is that work. There is the work that we have done in saying that we are going to make sure that we increase by 50%

the number of federal contracts that go to minority-owned businesses and women-owned businesses, and what that will mean for addressing some of these issues. The work that we are doing around housing and affordable housing. Secretary Marsha Fudge has been extraordinary in terms of the policies and the resources that we are putting into addressing the inequities that have long existed in terms of access to homeownership. We are addressing, for example,

The fact that the data has long told us that black homeowners get appraised at lower levels for their home, which means they're getting less money when they try to sell it. Mm-hmm.

than other homeowners. So these are just some examples of the work that we have done, not to mention the work that we are doing that is about pushing for student loan debt relief. We're not giving up on that. We're acutely aware that when you look, for example, at our policy about giving even greater student loan debt relief for Pell Grant recipients, knowing that the majority of black students, I believe, are Pell Grant recipients,

This work is all very intentional to address longstanding inequities and

that can be addressed in a way that everyone benefits. Yeah. What's the disconnect then between that and translating to more black votes? Why isn't that happening? Why don't you talk to me after 2024? Okay. We mentioned up there that the kind of gun safety legislation can feel like a drop in the bucket. And that comes up with voters that we talk to all the time, that while they recognize the administration's accomplishments, there's real structural barriers for getting kind of big things passed.

You can call it a structural barrier. I call it the United States Congress. When we look ahead to a second term, what is the message to voters who still see you all running up against those barriers over and over? Vote.gov. People need to vote. People need to vote in their numbers, and they are voting and they will vote. In 2020, we saw record turnout.

I cannot underemphasize the magnificence of the American people that during the height of a crisis, a pandemic, when there was an extraordinary loss of life, people lost their jobs, loss of normalcy. We had some of the highest turnout of voting in any presidential cycle. Young voters, historic turnout.

And it's because people understood the connection between their vote and the policies like those we have been able to pass. We haven't even begun to discuss what we have done on one of the biggest crises, front page of your newspaper and everywhere else, which is the climate crisis. Our administration has been able to get through, often without bipartisan support, what I estimate to be probably a trillion dollars.

that we are investing in climate resilience and adaptation, in clean energy, a new economy, job training, jobs. This is the work that we have done, and it's because people voted. And what we will be doing between now and November of 2024

is thanking them because they went out there and they said, this is what we want of our government and for our future. In 2020, the Biden message was really centered around that idea that there was kind of an emergency that needed to be stopped and kind of pointing toward Donald Trump. As the president said, he made the decision to run because he believed that the soul of America,

was very much at stake. Is that the message for 2024 too? Is it Soul of America Part 2? I don't know that we want to... Here's what I would say. What is at stake in 2024 is our democracy. Our democracy is on the line. And we are looking at a moment where we could go one of two ways. And one is to stand up in support of and defend our democracy and fundamental rights.

principles upon which we were found, such as freedom. And there is that track or there is a track that is about an attempt to destroy freedom

all that has made us strong over the years in terms of the importance of rule of law and democratic institutions. My last question is when we talk to Democrats about when they look ahead to 2024, they express confidence in the administration's kind of political achievements, but some have pointed to lagging poll numbers or lack of favorability from both the President Biden and to you and the numbers we see. What is your response to the idea that we see in some data that

the favorability question around you and that when you say, when you look and say what Vice President Kamala Harris brings to the ticket, what is that clear answer? Were you in this room of 2,000 people? Mm-hmm. Did you see them cheering and standing? Mm-hmm. That's what I say. Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate your time. You're welcome. This week, watching Harris take over Biden's campaign. Ready to get to work? I'm reminded of how quickly things change.

Almost overnight, all those questions that once hounded Harris, including some that I asked, seemed kind of irrelevant. Do we believe in the promise of America? But I wonder how long that holds. And are we willing to fight for it? Because eventually, what Harris believes will come up again. And when we fight...

God bless you all and God bless the United States of America and Joe Biden. And this time, the entire election may ride on her answer.

This podcast is supported by USA for UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency. UNHCR responds to humanitarian emergencies around the world that have caused record levels of displacement and human suffering. 90% of refugees live in countries facing food shortages and malnutrition. Your support is critical.

That's the run-up for Thursday, July 25th, 2024. And now, the rundown. I'm speaking to you tonight from behind the Resolute desk in the Oval Office. On Wednesday evening... I believe...

My record as president, my leadership in the world, my vision for America's future, all merited a second term. Biden addressed the country from the Oval Office. But nothing, nothing can come in the way of saving our democracy. That includes personal ambition. Outlining his decision to end his re-election campaign. So I've decided the best way forward is to pass the torch to a new generation. It's the best way to unite our nation.

and his priorities for the rest of his time in office. I'll keep defending our personal freedoms and our civil rights, from the right to vote to the right to choose. I'll keep calling out hate and extremism. Harris' campaign said it raised over $126 million between Sunday and Tuesday. And on a call with journalists, Donald Trump expressed interest in debating her. I think it's important. I would be willing to do more than one debate, actually.

Also this week, Republican vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance has been holding his first solo rallies. Our country has been saddled for three and a half years with a president who cannot do the job. And that is all because Kamala Harris and the rest of the Democrats lied about his ability to be our president. He will be at a fundraising event with Trump on Thursday and at two events on Friday in St. Louis and in Oklahoma City.

We're 25 days from the Democratic National Convention and 103 days from the general election. See you next week. The Run-Up is reported by me, Ested Herndon, and produced by Elisa Gutierrez, Caitlin O'Keefe, and Anna Foley. It's edited by Rachel Dry and Lisa Tobin, with original music by Dan Powell, Marion Lozano, Pat McCusker, Diane Wong, Sophia Landman, and Alisha Ba'i-Tubin.

It was mixed by Isaac Jones and fact-checked by Caitlin Love. Special thanks to Paula Schumann, Sam Dolnick, Larissa Anderson, David Halfinger, Maddie Macielo, Mahima Chablani, Jeffrey Miranda, and Elizabeth Bristow. Do you have questions about the 2024 election? Email us at therunupatnytimes.com. Or better yet, record your question using the voice memo app in your phone. That email again is therunupatnytimes.com. Thanks for listening, y'all.

This podcast is supported by Progressive Insurance. Most of you aren't just listening right now. You're driving, cleaning, and even exercising. But what if you could be saving money by switching to Progressive? Drivers who save by switching save nearly $750 on average, and auto customers qualify for an average of seven discounts. Multitask right now. Quote today at Progressive.com. Progressive

of Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. National average 12-month savings of $744 by new customer surveyed who saved with Progressive between June 2022 and May 2023. Potential savings will vary. Discounts not available in all states and situations.