Imagine failing at the most important job interview of your life as the world watched you and then having the audacity to create a center for “policy and ideas.”
That is allegedly the case for former Vice President Kamala Harris, who was defeated by President Donald Trump in the 2024 presidential election in a that was so resounding that Republicans kept the House and took back the Senate and won the popular vote for president for the first time since 2004, The New York Times reported.
In a piece published on Thursday and titled, “Sidelined and Still Processing Her Defeat, Harris Looks for a Way Back In,” The Times said that the former vice president and her husband, Doug Emhoff, are “weighing each new opportunity with the potential political blowback in mind” as they chart a course for the future.
“One possibility: establishing an institute for policy and ideas,” it said. “Brian Nelson, an adviser to Ms. Harris since she was California’s attorney general, has broached the idea with several universities, including Howard and Stanford. But some allies have noted that raising money for such a center could, depending on the donors, create liabilities in future races.”
The news was met with ridicule on X, where people mocked the former candidate who was not really known for her ideas.
“The ‘Kamala Harris Institute for Policies and Ideas’ sounds a little bit like a Babylon Bee headline. Sort of like if the Kardashians opened a think tank,” Republican commentator Matt Whitlock said.
“NYT: Kamala Harris, known for her deep knowledge and ability to articulate complex issues, is thinking about launching ‘an institute for policy and ideas,’” Washington Free Beacon senior writer Andrew Stiles quipped.
“The Kamala D. Harris Institute for Examining the Importance of Understanding What Needs to Be Done,” he said.
“I can only imagine the type of deep thinkers that will be affiliated with this venture,” Joe Jackson, the communications director for Republican Sen. Cynthia Lummis, said.
“[The Babylon Bee] can’t compete with this,” Nathan Brand, a communications professional and political advisor, said.
“The Kamala Harris Center for the Unburdening of What Has Been should provide a bottomless well of material,” Doug Powers of Twitchy said.
Harris’ 2024 presidential campaign was apparently doomed from the very start.
An excerpt from the new book “FIGHT: Inside the Wildest Battle for the White House” by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes details several of the absurd demands from the Harris team and how “no daylight” from former President Joe Biden crippled the Harris campaign.
The excerpt from the book notes that Harris’s first interview was a disaster.
As she watched it unfold in front of a national audience eager to see if she could succeed former President Joe Biden, the newly appointed and unexpected Democratic Party nominee looked uncertain of herself and, worse, small.
Harris’s aides concluded that the chair was the issue, not the fact that she avoided questions and instead allowed running mate Tim Walz to join her on-screen and speak for the majority of the time. Anybody who wanted to interview her would then need to meet a rigorous set of requirements regarding the height, arms, and legs of each chair.
“Leg height no less than 15 inches; floor to top of seat height no less than 18.9 inches; arms on chairs may not be very high, arms must fall at a natural height; chairs must be firm,” read a copy of the staging requirement Harris aides passed to reporters which was obtained by The Hill.
Days after Harris launched her disastrous bid to lead the party, she praised the administration and distanced herself from its most unpopular policies. This was one of the demands made by her campaign. Still stinging from the humiliation of being forced to leave, Biden kept repeating what he wanted to see from his vice president.
“No daylight,” Biden remarked.
He made it clear to his aides—many of whom later surrounded and took control of Harris’s campaign apparatus in the weeks that followed—that her proposals and his policies should coincide.
