Kamala Harris ‘concerned’ she did not ask Biden to quit race

Kamala Harris, former US Vice President, expressed concern that she did not ask Joe Biden to withdraw from the race for the White House.

In a BBC interview on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg, she said: “I’m thinking about whether I should have a conversation with him and urge him not to run for re-election.”

After months of speculation about his health and mental state, President Biden ended his re-election bid in July 2024 after a disastrous performance in a debate against Donald Trump a few weeks ago.

Harris, who ran for the Democratic Party but lost to Trump, revealed in her book about her three-month campaign that she did not discuss with President Biden her concerns about his ability. The 81-year-old also did not raise the issue with her.

In his book “107 Days,” the former vice president wrote that Biden’s decision to run again was a choice that should not be “left to one’s vanity and ambition.” She “maybe” should have raised the matter with him, she wrote.

She told the BBC in this interview that she is still thinking about whether she should have acted differently and talked to him about it.

“I’m considering whether I should have a conversation with him and urge him not to run.” “What worries me, especially in terms of thinking, is, should I have really brought this up,” she said. She wondered whether it was “grace or recklessness” that prevented her from speaking out.

She added that her concern was not about Biden’s ability to carry out the task of commander in chief, but rather about whether he would meet the demands of a grueling election campaign to remain in the White House.

When asked why this distinction exists, she said there is a big difference between running for office and performing the duties of the office of president. She said running against Trump is more difficult.

She said she had “concern about him.” [Biden’s] “The ability, with the level of endurance and energy that it requires, especially in the face of an incumbent president.”

The former vice president said it was difficult for her to speak out because she risked being accused of promoting her political interests if she confronted Biden about his health.

“Part of the problem was, could this have been a really effective and productive conversation, given what might otherwise appear to be my own self-interest?”

The question of whether more people in Biden’s circle might challenge him on the wisdom of running again has become a major point of discussion.

One book, Original Sin by Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson, alleged that people close to him covered up his physical decline from the public.

Biden’s aides responded to the claim, saying there were physical changes as he got older but no evidence of mental disability and nothing that affected his ability to do the job.

In his first interview after leaving the White House, in May this year, Biden told the BBC that it would not have mattered if he had left the race sooner.

The former vice president is in the UK to promote her new book. In a wide-ranging conversation Sunday with The Laura Kuenssberg Show, Harris also said it was “possible” she could run for the White House again.

She has already ruled out running for governor of her home state, California, and the former prosecutor told the BBC she is “not done” with public service.