Kamala Harris Kicks Off Her Campaign With Major Snub to Netanyahu

Kamala Harris will most likely not appear beside Benjamin Netanyahu when he speaks to Congress this week. Former senior Biden administration officials say that was likely by design.

Harris declined to attend Netanyahu’s joint address later this week, Axios journalist Juliegrace Brufke reported Monday. And the decision was made before Joe Biden announced he was withdrawing from the 2024 race.

The vice president would have sat directly behind Netanyahu’s podium during the Wednesday event. Instead, last week, Biden’s campaign had scheduled her to speak in Indianapolis.

“That probably wasn’t an accident,” a former senior administration official told The Times of Israel. The source theorized that Biden may keep Harris away from the White House while Netanyahu is in town to avoid images that feature Harris associating with the Israeli prime minister. This would mark a significant shift in U.S. policy, if appearing with Netanyahu is suddenly viewed as a bad thing.

At the same time, Harris is receiving flack from Zionist organizations over comments she made about student protests in support of Palestine in an interview with The Nation earlier this month. The Zionist Organization of America accused Harris of endorsing “Arab Islamist criminality,” among other racist remarks.

However, a current U.S. official said that a future Harris administration’s policies on Palestine won’t differ much from Biden’s. “Vice President Harris shares President Biden’s support for an iron-clad U.S. commitment to Israel’s security coupled with a commitment to advancing a two-state solution in order to bring an end to this cycle of violence,” the official said, speaking anonymously.

But Biden may also snub Netanyahu. A senior official in his office told reporters that Netanyahu may not meet with the U.S. president after all. Meanwhile, a record number of Democrats are set to boycott Netanyahu’s speech.

Representative Nancy Pelosi is throwing her “enthusiastic support” behind Kamala Harris for president.

“Today, it is with immense pride and limitless optimism for our country’s future that I endorse Vice President Kamala Harris for President of the United States,” Pelosi wrote in a statement Monday. “My enthusiastic support for Kamala Harris for President is official, personal and political.”

Despite holding off a day longer than other Democrats, the fellow Bay Area politician has made clear she approves of Joe Biden’s decision to step down and hand the torch to Harris.

“Officially, I have seen Kamala Harris’s strength and courage as a champion for working families, notably fighting for a woman’s right to choose. Personally, I have known Kamala Harris for decades as rooted in strong values, faith and a commitment to public service,” she wrote. “Politically, make no mistake: Kamala Harris as a woman in politics is brilliantly astute—and I have full confidence that she will lead us to victory in November.”

After Biden dropped out, Pelosi and Harris spoke by phone on Sunday, according to Axios.

Though Pelosi never officially called for Biden to step down, she played a critical role in strong-arming him to bow out. Privately, Pelosi warned Biden about the ripple effects for other Democrats on the ballot. Additionally, she appeared on MSNBC’s Morning Joe saying she wanted Biden “to do whatever he decides to do,” while at the time Biden had made clear he planned to remain in the race.

While much of the Democratic establishment is falling in line behind Harris, those yet to endorse her include former President Barack Obama, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. spoke with Donald Trump earlier this month about getting a job in the White House in exchange for endorsing him as president.

The Washington Post reported Monday that in the hours after Trump’s attempted assassination last week, Kennedy received a message from the former president’s team asking to talk. At the time, Kennedy had been giving interviews about the attack.

Later that night, the two men spoke on the phone, and weighed the price of Kennedy’s support: a job in Trump’s administration. But apparently Kennedy’s job interview quickly fell apart.

Some on Trump’s team were reportedly concerned about offering the independent candidate an official role in return for his endorsement, according to sources who spoke with the Post on the condition of anonymity. So nothing materialized for either candidate.

A segment of a phone call between Kennedy and Trump was previously leaked on social media, in which the former president could be heard claiming that vaccines cause autism. Although Kennedy insisted before Congress last summer that he had “never been anti-vaxx,” he previously claimed that there was “no vaccine that was safe and effective,” and said he believed vaccines cause autism.

“I would love you to do something,” Trump said during that call. “And I think it would be so good for you. And so big for you. And we’re going to win. We’re going to win. We’re way ahead of the guy.” It was previously unclear what exactly Trump was referring to, but now it seems likely they were talking about a potential gig for the conspiracy-touting independent.

Kennedy apologized for the leak, and on Monday, he began praising Trump. “I have a lot of respect for President Trump for reaching out to me. Nobody from the DNC, high or low, has ever reached out to me in 18 months. Instead they have allocated millions to try to disrupt my campaign,” he said in an interview with the Post.

He added that he would continue his campaign.

A Trump spokesperson tried to downplay the significance of the meeting between the two. “President Trump met with RFK and they had a conversation about the issues just as he does regularly with important figures in business and politics because they all recognize he will be the next president of the United States,” said Danielle Alvarez.

Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris Monday morning and ripped Republican vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance in the process.

Speaking on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, Beshear touted Harris’s previous record as a prosecutor, saying that she is “kind and has empathy, which can make her a great president.

“The contrast between her and those running on the other side couldn’t be clearer,” Beshear said, pointing out that Harris prosecuted rapists and abusers, while Vance’s words about rape were egregious.

“Vance calls pregnancy arising from rape ‘inconvenient.’ No, it’s just plain wrong,” Beshear said. “He suggests that women should stay in abusive relationships. Listen, a domestic abuser isn’t a man, he’s a monster.”

Beshear’s endorsement carries a lot of weight, as he’s a twice-elected Democratic governor presiding over a red Southern state in Kentucky. He also has been discussed as a possible vice presidential running mate for Harris, even before Biden’s withdrawal from the presidential election Sunday, and in Monday’s interview, he hinted that he would be interested in the role.

“The only way I would consider something other than this current job is if I believe I could further help my people and to help this country,” Beshear said. When pressed further, he added, “I think if somebody calls you on that, what you do is you at least listen.”

Beshear is one of the most popular governors in America. An October poll found that he has the highest net approval rating of any Democratic governor in a red state. As Harris and her campaign decide who would be the ideal running mate for the Democratic ticket, Beshear’s success in Kentucky can only help his prospects.

On Monday, Mike Pence praised Biden’s decision to end his presidential bid and called for national unity. Despite the normalcy of Pence’s rhetoric, MAGA posters immediately began blasting the former vice president for his supposed traitorousness.

“President Joe Biden made the right decision for our country and I thank him for putting the interests of our Nation ahead of his own,” Pence wrote on X (formerly Twitter). “After the assassination attempt on President Trump and President Biden’s decision to end his campaign, now is a time for leaders in both parties to project calm and send a message of strength and resolve to America’s friends and enemies alike that, whatever the state of our politics, the American people are strong and our American military stands ready to defend our freedom and our vital national interests anywhere in the world.”

The statement was a tame call for national unity (albeit with some jingoism peppered in). Pence biographer Tom LoBianco called it “remarkably normal given the tone of things.”

But Pence has been persona non grata in Trump world since his refusal to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, and his post was flooded with replies deeming his banal call for civility further proof of his turncoat status.

The conservative interest group the Association of Mature American Citizens posted, “Praising Biden, pathetic.” Conservative commentator Joey Mannarino said, “This is why we consider you a traitor, Mike. Fuck off.” Various other MAGA accounts left comments like, “Judas Pence has spoken,” “You knew what was at risk by certifying a stolen election yet you did it anyway,” “We are only in this mess because of you, so shut the fuck up,” and so on.

The MAGA outrage over Pence’s quite ordinary statement reveals his own party’s limited appetite for the unity he espouses.