CHRIS CRUCIAL: Democrats are going to hate this but... 🤷

PLUS: Ilhan Omar primary!

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1. Kamala Harris — and the media

On Tuesday, according to her official schedule, Vice President Kamala Harris received “briefings” and conducted “internal meetings with staff.”

Those briefings and meetings were closed press. Meaning the media was, uh, not invited to attend — even briefly.

Harris has been the de facto Democratic presidential nominee for the last three weeks. (Joe Biden dropped out of the race 23 days ago.) She has formally been the Democratic nominee for a week.

In that time, she has given ZERO interviews with a mainstream media outlet. She has held a total of ZERO press conferences. And, by my count, she has answered less than 10 questions from reporters.

Which is a problem — whether you love Harris or hate her.

Before you immediately attack me in the comments, I’d hope you’ll hear me out.

What Harris is quite clearly doing is riding the enthusiasm generated by the Biden swap — and the resultant overwhelmingly positive press coverage — for as long as possible.

Witness the cover of Time magazine this week:

Harris has surged in polls — she is now the leader nationally and in several swing states. Her fundraising is through the roof. Everything she is doing is working.

Why then, many Democrats ask, would she ever agree to a media interview or take a series of questions from reporters? Why risk breaking her momentum?

That sentiment was nicely summed up in a quote from a person close to the campaign in a conversation with a Politico reporter last week: “What is the incentive for her [to take more questions]? She’s getting out exactly the message she wants to get out.”

The answer is because it’s the right thing to do. For democracy.

The Washington Post said as much in an op-ed over the weekend:

Since replacing President Joe Biden at the top of the 2024 Democratic ticket, Vice President Kamala Harris has neither given a sit-down interview nor held a news conference. Her campaign’s website lacks an “Issues” page (there’s only a biography). We get it, tactically: It’s tempting for Ms. Harris, as it would be for anyone in her position, to stay as vague on the issues as possible, for as long as possible, to avoid giving fodder to the opposition or dividing her supporters. Ms. Harris is confident she’ll win if the campaign is about the many flaws of former president Donald Trump.

Mr. Trump makes her task easier by regularly spouting falsehoods and wild rhetoric, such as his crack about Ms. Harris’s racial identity at a session of the National Association of Black Journalists. But at least he has taken questions, including hostile ones, both from NABJ and at a long news conference on Thursday.

If she hopes to prevail, Ms. Harris needs to present her ideas. The media and public have legitimate questions, and she should face them. This is a political necessity — Mr. Trump is already turning her avoidance of the media into an attack line. And elections aren’t just about winning. They’re about accumulating political capital for a particular agenda, which Ms. Harris can’t do unless she articulates one.

The election is in 84 days. Harris received a total of 0 votes during the Democratic primary process. She was entirely unchallenged for the nomination once Biden dropped out. She has, in a very short period of time, walked away from a series of liberal positions (a ban on fracking, support for the Green New Deal, mandatory buyback of assault weapons, Medicare for All) that she staked out during her 2020 campaign for president. She has offered no explanation for those policy flip flops.

And, not for nothing, Harris has struggled in the past to answer questions from the mainstream media. Her 2021 interview with NBC’s Lester Holt — in which she said she had been to the southern border even though she hadn’t — was an unmitigated disaster.

The only explanation that Democrats seem to offer in defense of Harris’ clear efforts to avoid the media is a master class in whataboutism: Why aren’t you spending your time calling on Donald Trump to do more mainstream media interviews? Or holding his feet to the fire when he lies during the interviews he does give?

Let me take the second question first: I am literally the only journalist who is committed to going through virtually every speech or interview that Trump gives line by line — and pulling out the stuff you need to see.

It’s a hugely labor-intensive project. Going through Trump’s interview with Elon Musk, for example, took me 5+ hours today. But I do it because it matters. What Trump says — and what he says that’s not true — is really, really important.

So, don’t try to sell that WHY DON’Y YOU FACT CHECK TRUMP narrative on me. I do.

On the question of pressuring Trump to do more mainstream media interviews, I agree! I can make the case that Trump does, occasionally, talk to outlets outside of his fan base — his interview with the National Association of Black Journalists is one example — but there’s no doubt that he tends to lean on his media friends (Sean Hannity, Fox and Friends etc.) when he wants to talk.

But, to me, the reliance on whataboutism to defend Harris’ total lack of media interaction fundamentally undermines the argument long made by top Democratic candidates and strategists: That their party is better and more committed to democratic ideals than Trump and Republicans.

If that’s true, then how do you explain Harris not only following Trump’s press strategy but one-upping him when it comes to a total lack of engagement with the media?

If Democrats are more committed to democratic principles — chief among them the centrality of a free and independent media — then how is “oh yeah well Trump does the same thing!!!” a convincing argument?

Right?

Either the press — and interacting with them — is an essential part of how democracy should function or, well, it isn’t. You don’t get to attack Trump for his efforts to undermine the media and argue that Harris can ignore the media because she is winning.

Winning at all costs — which is what Democrats have rightly criticized Trump over — has consequences for how you can (or can’t) lead once you are in office. You don’t get to stand up for capital “D” democracy only when it’s convenient for your political goals. Standing up for democracy when it’s against your political interests is when it really matters.

2. The Squad faces another primary

One week after Missouri Rep. Cori Bush lost a high-profile — and costly — Democratic primary, another member of the so-called “Squad” faces an intraparty fight today.

Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar is battling several challengers in her solidly Democratic Minneapolis-based 5th district — the best known of which is Don Samuels, a former Minneapolis city councilman who almost beat Omar two years ago.

In that race, Omar bested Samuels 50%-48% — a margin of just more than 2,000 votes out of more than 110,000 cast.

Given the narrowness of her victory and the losses of both Bush and, earlier this summer, New York Rep. Jamaal Bowman — like Omar, both are members of the liberal “Squad” in the House — you might expected Omar to be in deep trouble.

But there’s one critical difference between Bush/Bowman and Omar: The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) has not invested millions to beat her. (AIPAC spent more than $15 million to beat Bowman and more than $8 million to oust Bush.)

It’s not immediately clear why AIPAC decided not to target Omar. Like Bush and Bowman, Omar has been very critical of Israel’s military actions in the wake of the Hamas attacks of October 7, 2023.

At a press conference last fall in which she called for a ceasefire in the region, Omar said that “Israel has dropped more bombs in the last 10 days then we dropped in a whole year in Afghanistan. Where is your humanity? Where is your outrage? Where is your care for people?”

And, like Bush and Bowman, Omar was one of a handful of liberal Democrats to oppose President Biden’s infrastructure bill. “Passing the infrastructure bill without passing the Build Back Better Act first risks leaving behind child care, paid leave, health care, climate action, housing, education, and a road map to citizenship,” she said at the time.

Because of the lack of AIPAC money in the district, Omar has a massive financial edge over Samuels. As of the end of July, she had spent more than $6 million on the race with almost $700,000 still in the bank. Samuels had spent $1.2 million with just over $200,000 left on hand.

3. Newsrooms pass on hacked Trump campaign documents

For all of Donald Trump’s talk about how the “fake news” is out to get him, the available evidence makes clear that the mainstream media continues to operate in an ethical and fair way.

The latest? A number of large media organizations — the Washington Post, the New York Times, Politico — have passed on reporting on memos and other documents that appear to have been stolen from Trump’s campaign in a hacking incident.

Here’s the Post:

Over the past few weeks, reporters at Politico, The Washington Post and the New York Times received emails from a mysterious figure who called himself “Robert,” offering internal Trump campaign documents, most notably a 271-page one listing JD Vance’s potential vulnerabilities as a running mate, apparently compiled well before Trump picked the Republican senator from Ohio.

The FBI is now investigating alleged Iranian hacking attempts, which also targeted the Biden-Harris campaign. Longtime Trump friend Roger Stone confirmed to The Post on Monday that his email account had been compromised….

….Reporters confirmed the document’s authenticity, then attempted to learn the individual’s identity; the emailer refused to get on the phone but said there was additional information to share. When Politico pressed how they got the documents, the person wrote back: “I suggest you don’t be curious about where I got them from. Any answer to this question, will compromise me and also legally restricts you from publishing them.”

Then Microsoft revealed early Friday that Iranian hackers had tried to get into the email account of a “high-ranking official” in a presidential campaign by using a former senior adviser’s email address that had already been compromised; The Post reported that that was a reference to the Trump campaign, citing a person familiar with Microsoft’s work.

Stories like this don’t get nearly the attention that ones reporting on the hacked documents would.

But these smart and ethical decisions by major newsrooms show that, despite all of the criticism of how the media does its job, there is a concerted effort — particularly in light of the hacking of Hillary Clinton’s email in 2016 — to get it right this time around.

NOTABLE QUOTABLE

“I have good manners, not like him.” — President Joe Biden affirming he would attend Donald Trump’s inauguration in January 2025 if Trump wins the White House in November. (Trump did not go to Biden inauguration in 2021.)

ONE GOOD CHART

People are increasingly less interested in hearing companies comment on political and policy matters, according to new data from Gallup.

SONG OF THE DAY

Adrianne Lenker is the lead singer of Big Thief, one of the best bands making music these days. She also released an amazing solo album earlier this year called “Bright Future.” Here’s a previously-unreleased tune from those recording sessions, called “Once a Bunch.”

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