CNN
—

Kamala Harris, in CNN’s exclusive first interview with the vice president since becoming the Democratic presidential nominee, showed how she plans to deal with Donald Trump and win the presidential election, avoiding slip-ups that could have hampered her momentum.

Harris went into Thursday’s interview amid intense criticism, with Trump and his allies accusing her of dodging the press and predicting she would buckle under pressure, be undermined by her own policy shifts and dampen the spirits surrounding her campaign.

The vice president favored broad themes and aspirations over detailed policy plans, declining to fully explain what had changed on immigration and energy. But she was a more agile, disciplined and prepared political figure than she appeared in her short-lived bid for the 2020 Democratic nomination or in the awkward moments early in her vice presidential tenure. Harris deftly parried questions and follow-ups about her vulnerabilities by shifting to safer talking points, something she failed to do in a damaging 2021 interview with NBC.

Harris also steered clear of obvious mistakes that would derail her campaign and force her into damage control ahead of her Sept. 10 debate showdown with the former president in Philadelphia. And a week after her keynote speech at the Democratic convention expanded on her core argument that it was time to “turn the page” on Trump’s divisiveness, she also refused to be sucked into her Republican rival’s provocations about her racial identity.

She brushed the issue aside, simply telling CNN’s Dana Bash, “Same old tired playbook. Next question, please.” Her response showed that she has no intention of letting questions about race overshadow the campaign, even though her potential as the first black woman and Indian-American president will be a constant backdrop for the rest of the campaign.

Harris was at ease and pragmatic, in contrast to her opponent’s prickly self-obsession and bombast. Her stance, as she sought to appeal to available voters unenthusiastic about former President Joe Biden, likely met most of her campaign’s goals for the interview and was consistent with her apparent strategy of providing a safe haven for any American disgusted by Trump.

She also debunked claims by Trump and conservative media that she used running mate Gov. Tim Walz as a crutch in the interview and couldn’t answer questions herself because she dominated the time and was clearly the senior partner in their duo.

She used the interview to develop her core attack on Trump’s character and behavior, which is the basis of the argument she makes to voters. “I think unfortunately, over the last decade, we’ve had someone in the former president who has really pushed an agenda and an environment that undermines the character and the strength of who we are as Americans, and that really divides our nation,” Harris told Bash.

Later, at a rally in Savannah, Georgia, where the interview was conducted, she warned her audience that the recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling granting Trump broad immunity from criminal prosecution meant the ex-president would retaliate against those who disagreed with him. “Understand: This is not 2016 or 2020. This is different.”

But Harris remained vague about what exactly she would do as president. She focused more on themes and ambitions than on specific policies. At times, she lingered on key issues to avoid the painful choices she would face in the White House.

Her answers were filled with ways she hoped to help the middle class by lowering prices, making housing more affordable, lowering drug prices and creating new jobs. But Harris didn’t lay out a clear path for navigating treacherous politics to implement such plans. Nor did she say how she would pay for such programs.

Her tendency to speak in generalities rather than policy details was illustrated by the first question in the interview, when she was unable to give a precise answer about a specific step she would take on Day One of her presidency. She spoke broadly about her economic plan and work to invest in the American family, concluding, “There are a number of things on Day One.”

Harris also brushed aside questions about why she had served as vice president for three and a half years and had no influence on items in the administration’s economic plan, providing a potential opening for the Trump campaign. And while she effectively showed that she understands the painful impact of high grocery prices, she was unable to fully explain why they had risen so high under the Biden-Harris administration.

Instead, the vice president accused Trump of creating an economic crisis that she and Biden inherited through his mismanagement of the COVID-19 pandemic, and pointed to the White House’s strong record on job creation and lowering inflation.

At times, Harris’ pragmatism faded into vagueness. When confronted with a reversal of her earlier opposition to fracking — a major issue in swing state Pennsylvania — she insisted she hadn’t really reversed her stance. “What I’ve seen is that we can grow and create a thriving clean energy economy without banning fracking,” she said.

Many climate activists would argue that fracking — a practice used to extract hard-to-reach oil and gas that can pollute water sources and harm wildlife — is incompatible with a green economy. Yet Harris insisted that while she opposed a fracking ban, “my values ​​haven’t changed,” an apparent attempt to disguise conflicting views.

She also took a bipartisan approach to the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, which has resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands of civilians. Harris argued that Israel should have the right to defend itself, but that “far too many Palestinian civilians have been killed.” As the administration tries to broker a deal between Israel and Hamas to release remaining hostages and reach a ceasefire, the vice president insisted, “We have to make a deal.” That may be the only way out of the horror, but American diplomacy has fallen short of that goal for months, failing to end the civilian toll in Gaza. And events in the conflict have shown that Harris’s position that Israel should have the right to defend itself, but that too many Palestinians have died, has often been irreconcilable.

Harris also subtly addressed the question of why she argued that Biden was fit to serve another four-year term, even after his disastrous performance in the CNN debate in Atlanta. She said she had no regrets about her comments and paid glowing tribute to the president, saying that “he has the intelligence and the dedication and the judgment and the spirit that I think the American people rightly deserve in their president.”

And while she demonstrated the political dexterity that many inside and outside her party once thought she lacked, yet managed to unite her party and erase Trump’s lead in the polls, Harris quickly pivoted to harsh criticism of Trump, detailing the entire reasoning behind her run for the White House.

“I’m talking about an era that began about a decade ago, where there was a suggestion, I think twisted, that the measure of a leader’s power is based on who you knock down, rather than what I think most Americans believe, which is the belief that the true measure of a leader’s power is based on who you lift up.”

“That’s what’s at stake, just like every other detail we can discuss in this election.”