US Vice President Kamala Harris has dismissed speculation that the White House set her up to fail, despite the fact that she has been tasked with resolving some of the country’s most difficult problems.
Harris’ to-do list from the White House includes contentious issues such as voting rights, which has hit a snag in the Senate, and immigration policy, for which she has been heavily criticized, particularly the immigration situation at the southern border.
“I don’t think I’m set up to fail,” Harris said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.” “More importantly, as Vice President of the United States, everything I handle is because it’s a difficult issue.” And it couldn’t be dealt with at any other level.”
Harris then sidestepped a question about whether she believes she is subjected to extra scrutiny because she is a woman from a minority background.
Harris is the first African-American and Asian-American vice president of the United States.
“I’ll let others deal with that.” I, you know… “I have a job,” she explained.
She insisted that voting rights legislation isn’t dead, though she refused to support one possible path to passage: abolishing the Senate filibuster.
Harris also stood by her controversial remarks from June, in which she told migrants in Latin America, “Do not come.”
“The vast majority of people, wherever they come from,” she said, “don’t want to leave home.” “They don’t want their loved ones to leave.”
Despite Democratic moderate Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia saying he would not support the bill in the evenly divided Senate, Harris expressed hope that Democrats can still pass the sweeping social and climate spending plan known as Build Back Better.
Later, however, he stated that the legislation should go through the lengthy committee review process, implying that Democrats can earn his support.
“I was in the Senate for four years before coming here, and I’ve seen the ups and downs of legislation,” Harris explained. “I’m not giving up, neither is the president, and frankly, the stakes are too high.”
Harris also refrained from criticizing Manchin.
“I think the stakes are too high for this to be about any particular person,” she said.
It has been a difficult first year for the Biden administration, which has faced harsh criticism for the haphazard withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan, while inflation has risen at the fastest rate in three decades, and the covid-19 pandemic has erupted.
“I wholeheartedly supported the president’s decision to [withdraw] after what appeared to be an endless war,” she said.
“We’re working through the UN and doing what we need to do through our friends to provide humanitarian assistance, avoiding the Taliban to ensure that we’re supporting women and girls there,” Harris explained.
