While Democrats have focused on blaming Joe Biden for their 2024 defeat, a new book highlights his vice president's role in a cover-up that eventually led to political disaster.
According to Original Sin, which chronicles the effort to hide Biden's cognitive decline, Kamala Harris had a vulgar response to being asked about Biden's disastrous debate performance on CNN.
The authors of Original Sin, Jake Tapper especially, have taken heavy criticism, with many calling their book's premise hypocritical given the liberal media's role in protecting Biden.
Biden's support from the media evaporated instantly after his horrid debate performance on CNN, which left his own party scrambling to push him off the presidential ticket. Tapper, who co-authored Original Sin with Axios' Alex Thompson, was one of the moderators of the pivotal debate between Biden and President Trump.
At the time, Harris struggled to defend Biden's "slow start" in a post-debate interview with CNN's Anderson Cooper.
“It was a slow start. That’s obvious to everyone — I’m not going to debate that point,” Harris said at the time.
In private, Harris was beside herself over what she felt to be Cooper's disrespect.
“‘This mother----- doesn’t treat me like the damn vice president of the United States," Harris said to colleagues, according to Original Sin. “I thought we were better than that.”
Harris' thin-skinned reaction certainly suggests she was aware of Biden's decline and knew that it could not hold up to actual scrutiny - which Biden managed to avoid for most of his presidency with help from his media buddies.
Her response also highlights her own serious flaws as a politician, which have perhaps been overlooked in her party's post-election narrative.
After she became the new hope of the Democrats, it was quickly evident that Harris had trouble managing the expectations placed on her. She spent a long stretch of the campaign avoiding interviews, leaving her policies and personality undefined to many voters. Harris also confessed to losing sleep after Biden dropped out and even admitted to stress eating in the past to cope with Trump's 2016 victory.
Indeed, one could argue that Harris' campaign was doomed to failure much as Biden's presidency was. Simply put, she was not up to the job, but instead of being filtered out, she was given a coronation by her party and then breathlessly promoted by a compromised media.
According to a different post-election book, Harris was so convinced by the hype surrounding her candidacy that she could not process Trump's victory.
