In her first major television interview since President Joe Biden ended his re-election plans, Vice President Kamala Harris broke new ground with CNN’s Dana Bash: The Democratic nominee pledged to appoint at least one Republican to her White House Cabinet if elected. As The Washington Post reported:
“I’ve spent my career inviting diversity of opinion,” Harris said, explaining her intention to appoint a GOP Cabinet secretary. “I think it’s important to have people at the table, when some of the most important decisions are being made, who have different opinions, different experiences. And I think it would be to the benefit of the American public to have a member of my Cabinet who was a Republican.”
She began her remarks on the matter by saying, “I’ve got 68 days left in this election, so I’m not putting the cart before the horse. But I would, I think [add bipartisanship to the White House Cabinet]. I think it’s really important.”
The vice president didn’t mention any Republicans by name, though it’s easy to identify some GOP figures who might be in the running. After all, Harris has already received endorsements from several notable Republicans — some currently in office, others former officials — and Democrats included several GOP speakers at the party’s national convention in Chicago.
It’s worth noting for context that this wasn’t just a comment from Harris: Before the interview aired in its entirety on CNN, the Democratic nominee’s presidential campaign issued a press release promoting a pledge to add a Republican to her proposed Cabinet and encouraging people to watch a video clip of her remarks.
In other words, Team Harris has responded well to this.
There’s no great mystery why: Trump appears to have overwhelming support on the right, but the Democratic nominee believes she can assemble an electoral coalition with independents and GOP voters who might be skeptical of their party’s scandal-plagued nominee. The Cabinet’s pledge bolsters her bipartisan credentials.
Moreover, it connects Harris to a modern, pre-Trump tradition of sorts. Bill Scher of The Washington Monthly — in a piece published before the CNN interview — explained:[A] Some cross-pollination in a Cabinet has historically been common. Every president from Franklin D. Roosevelt to Barack Obama had at least one Cabinet member from the other party for some time during their administrations. Obama appointed three Republicans to his Cabinet, including Senator Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and former CIA Director Robert Gates as secretaries of defense, and his colleague from Illinois, Representative Ray LaHood, as secretary of transportation.”
Trump broke the streak, and despite his many bipartisan victories, Biden has had no GOP members in his Cabinet. Harris, however, apparently intends to buck the modern trend.
Will Trump respond in kind with a similar promise? It’s possible, but it’s hard to imagine any Democrat willing to join his team.
This article was originally published on MSNBC.com
