Says not getting out of DC more is her big failure

Vice President Kamala Harris has said in a new interview that her “biggest failure” is not traveling outside DC more often, brushing off record illegal-immigration numbers and reports of White House disharmony.

“What do you think your biggest failure has been at this point?” CBS News’ Margaret Brennan asked Harris in the interview, which will air on “Face the Nation” Sunday.

“To not get out of DC more,” Harris replied, laughing as she avoided more divisive issues, such as her decision to wait three months to visit the USMexico border after President Biden tapped her to address the “root causes” of the migrant crisis.

The veep’s approval rating has dipped as low as 28% in recent polls, well below Biden’s low ratings. Meanwhile, her office is facing a staff exodus amid reports that Harris is unpleasant to subordinates.

In her interview, Harris claimed that she had not left the Beltway as often she would have liked because the pandemic had limited travel and because she had been working side by side with Biden.

“The president and I came in, you know, COVID had already started. The pandemic had started. And when we came in, we really couldn’t travel, you know. A large part of the relationship that he and I have built has been being together in the same office for hours on end doing Zooms or whatever because we couldn’t get out of DC,” she said.

But Harris also noted her concerns about existing in a “bubble.”

“On issues that are about fighting for anything from voting rights to child care to one of the issues that I care deeply about, maternal health, being with the people who are directly impacted by this work, listening to them so that they — not some pundit — tells us what their priorities are, I think, is critically important,” she said.

“People have a right to know and believe that their government actually sees and hears them. And my biggest concern is I don’t ever want to be in a bubble when it comes to being aware of and in touch with what people need at any given moment in time.”

It was unclear when Harris, who departed for a holiday trip to Los Angeles on Wednesday, recorded the interview.

Making the rounds

The sit-down appears to be part of a year-end media blitz by Harris.

She recently claimed to The Wall Street Journal that she and Biden had never discussed running together again in 2024, admitted to the Los Angeles Times that the administration didn’t anticipate the Omicron variant of COVID-19, and got testy with radio host Charlamagne tha God when he asked if centrist Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) was the “real president.”

Harris’ average favorability rating is below 40%, according to RealClearPolitics, making her vulnerable to a potential challenge to replace Biden in 2024 or 2028.

Allies have argued that Harris, the country’s first female and second nonwhite vice president, has been unfairly scrutinized by the media due to her race and gender. And The New York Times reported this week that Harris herself has said she would get better press if she were a white man.

Similarly, a former Harris aide recently told CNN that some of the vice president’s supporters believe the West Wing gives less support to Harris, who is of African and Indian ancestry, than to Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who is white.