Harris' campaign fears debate rules negotiated by Biden will 'handcuff' her: 'She could get thrown off'
WASHINGTON, DC: Vice President Kamala Harris reportedly wanted to tout her prosecutorial experience in her first face-off with former president Donald Trump. Her desire to retort to her Republican rival with fact checks and question him was only possible if her demand for unmuted microphones was granted.
However, ABC News ruled out her calls citing a negotiation set by President Joe Biden in his first presidential debit with Trump.
The network announced last week that the microphones would remain muted after the candidate's allotted time. This led four campaign officials from the vice president's team to argue that she would be "handcuffed" by the regulations put forth by her boss.
Biden, who planned to continue in the 2024 race, unknowingly created a hindrance to his potential predecessor, stopping her from confronting the GOP presidential nominee on the highly anticipated debate on September 10.
Kamala Harris' campaign says muted mics could hinder VP's debate performance
"Trump’s worst moments in the debates are when he gets upset and snaps," an anonymous official from the Kamala Harris campaign told Politico. "And they have neutered that."
Though some Democrats in private dismissed the frustration among the VP's campaign regarding the rules as a strategy for the upcoming debate in Philadelphia, some pointed at her lack of experience in a national election debate and how it could impact her performance in light of the rule change.
"She could get thrown off by [the muted mics], so putting [their frustration] about the mics out there, they’re preparing for that possibility," another anonymous Democratic strategist told the outlet.
"Or they've also got a set piece ready to go, where Harris could turn to the camera and say, 'For those who can't hear it, Donald Trump is trying to yell over me. How many of you have been in a meeting where you get talked over?'" the unnamed strategist added.
David Axelrod, an adviser to former president Barack Obama's campaign, however, held the opinion that Harris' frustrations about the muted mics could help her to "get into Trump's head" because the MAGA spearhead would not like being portrayed as someone who was handled by his campaign as the Democrats claimed the ex-presient's team do not trust him with self-control.
Kamala Harris might be inheriting debate rules set by Joe Biden
A person familiar with Kamala Harris' campaign said that the VP's team considered her a more efficient debater than Biden, leading her to inherit the debate rules set by the president.
"It was a bad set of rules for someone who needed to be protected, who never should’ve been on the debate stage," the anonymous Democratic strategist claimed. "And now they’re stuck with it."
Despite negotiating his rules, Biden managed to end his White House re-election bid by displaying a poor performance against Trump in their face-off hosted by CNN in June.
The backlash that ensued from the debate stage led to concerns about his cognitive fitness among Democratic lawmakers as well as donors, ultimately forcing him to end the presidential race and endorse Harris for the nomination.
Irrespective of Harris adapting the Biden administration's legislative achievement and political inheritance as her own, she and her team fought nail and tooth to reverse the muted mic rule but to no avail.
The vice president's senior communications adviser Brian Fallon, in a letter to ABC News last week, said that Harris reluctantly agreed to the muted mic and other original rules.
He added that it "fundamentally disadvantaged" the former prosecutor and would help "to shield Donald Trump from direct exchanges with the Vice President."
The former president, despite publicly claiming he supported the unmute mic rule, remained adamant in the negotiation with the network that only the speaker's mic should remain unmuted, as in his first debate with Biden.
Kamala Harris' debate preparations
Kamala Harris' debate preparations are led by attorney Karen Dunn, who coached her in 2020, and policy expert Rohini Kosoglu.
Karen Finney, a former aide of Hillary Clinton, added that the VP's mock debate would help her practice conveying her thoughts in two minutes without being stuck in the weeds.
In the days before her looming face-off with Trump, Harris is expected to attend multiple 90-minute mock debates, in which former Clinton aide Philippe Reines would repeat his role as the MAGA spearhead.
