Interview shows challenges as Harris settles in

WASHINGTON — Vice President Kamala Harris has spent her first two weeks in office working with the president on coronavirus relief, consulting with the head of the World Health Organization and talking with the prime minister of Canada.

It’s her interview with a local news station in West Virginia, though, that’s getting more attention — and not in a good way.

West Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, a moderate whose support is critical to the success of President Joe Biden’s agenda in Congress, didn’t take kindly to the vice president’s effort to put public pressure on him in his home state by urging passage of a $1.9 trillion virus relief package, especially when he had no warning it was coming.

“I couldn’t believe it. No one called me,” Manchin said later on the same TV station. “We’re going to try to find a bipartisan pathway forward. I think we need to. But we need to work together. That’s not a way of working together.”

The flap was an early signal of some of the issues Harris faces as she settles in and seeks to define her position within the White House.

“Harris has a challenge in figuring out what is her role, what’s her specialty in this White House,” said longtime Democratic strategist Joel Payne.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki was asked about Harris and her remarks twice during Monday’s briefing, and offered little insight into how the interview came about.

And by Tuesday, Manchin himself was looking to move past the controversy, telling reporters that it was just a “mistake” and there were “no apologies needed.”

In addition to the West Virginia television appearance, Harris also did interviews with the editorial board of the state’s biggest newspaper, as well as with a newspaper and local television station in Arizona, putting pressure on that state’s moderate Democratic senators.