‘I’m Speaking’: What Harris’ Top Debate Moments Could Tell Us About Tuesday Night
During the 2020 election cycle, Kamala Harris participated in five Democratic primary debates and, as the vice presidential nominee, one general election debate. Her performances in the primary debates showed that she was unafraid to instigate attacks, but could be unsteady when on the receiving end of one.
Her most memorable debate moments were a mix of carefully crafted attacks by and against her during the primary race, and a spontaneous exchange with Vice President Mike Pence that demonstrated what her advisers would like to see again Tuesday against former President Donald Trump.
On Tuesday, Harris will be judged by how she delivers planned attacks on Trump and defends herself against his. But her spontaneous reactions to the night’s surprises could well be what voters remember the most.
Sign up for The Morning newsletter from the New York Times
Here is a look at the three biggest moments that shaped Harris’ debate performances from the last election cycle and what they might mean for her this time around.
Hitting Biden on Busing: ‘That Little Girl Was Me’
This exchange was carefully choreographed by Harris and her aides, who believed the only path through the crowded Democratic primary race was to bring down Biden, the front-runner. With the next fundraising deadline looming, her campaign also needed a buzzy moment to juice donations and hit its financial targets for the quarter.
The structure and execution of the attack were part of what made it so effective. Harris began by saying, “I do not believe you are a racist.”
Starting that way depersonalized the biting criticism, her aides had argued when they rehearsed the line, allowing it to appear more focused on policy differences. Biden was a beloved figure in the party, so if Harris appeared to be making a character critique, her move could backfire. The prelude would also prevent Biden from making what could be a damaging retort, turning the question back on her by asking whether she was calling him racist — a question Harris would have rather avoided wrestling with directly.
Next, Harris took a dated issue — Biden’s opposition to federally mandated busing to integrate public schools in the 1970s — and transformed it into a way to raise questions about his record on racial relations more broadly.
“There was a little girl in California who was part of the second class to integrate her public schools and she was bused to school every day,” she said. “And that little girl was me.”
The issue was already in the political conversation at the time. Nine days earlier, Biden had attracted criticism for speaking warmly about his relationships with segregationist senators in the 1970s.
Beyond the questions about Biden’s record on race, Harris’ attack made an implicit generational comparison. While Biden was deciding policy about school integration, Harris was just a child being affected by his choices. In a race dominated by younger, more racially diverse candidates, Biden’s age was his biggest liability.
By the time she left the stage, her attack had gone viral. Her campaign quickly capitalized, selling T-shirts featuring a photo of a school-aged Harris with pigtails. She raised more than $2 million in the 24 hours after the debate and surged into second place in the crowded primary.
Still, resentment about the exchange lingered for months among Biden’s aides, who maintained that she had unfairly implied he was racist.
When Tulsi Gabbard Threw Harris Off-Balance
The power of this exchange came not only from the attack itself but also from Harris’ reaction — and from the fact that the punch had been landed by a low-polling candidate. It was a notably weak moment for Harris, who is otherwise known for her skill on the debate stage.
It had been obvious that one of her opponents would question her about her criminal justice record. Harris defined herself for much of her political career as a “smart on crime” prosecutor, proudly labeling herself California’s “top cop.”
But attitudes toward prosecutors had shifted within the Democratic Party by 2019, a reaction to several high-profile police killings of Black people and a growing belief that the criminal justice system was a driver of racial inequality.
Suddenly, Harris’ calling card was a lot more complicated to explain to Democratic voters, and a clear weakness in a primary race where progressives played an important role.
Gabbard attacked her on it directly and forcefully, leaving little room for Harris to avoid the question.
“The bottom line is, Sen. Harris, when you were in a position to make a difference and an impact in these people’s lives, you did not,” Gabbard said.
In response, Harris said she had done the “work of significantly reforming the criminal justice system” and noted that she was a longtime opponent of the death penalty. But she failed to aggressively bat away the attack or convincingly detail how she had brought about change. Part of her problem was, in fact, her record: During much of her career as California’s attorney general, she took cautious, incremental action on criminal justice.
Not only was Harris unable to deflect the attack, she took a hit from a candidate who was hardly a contender. At the time, Gabbard was barely winning 1% of support in primary polls.
It was clear the exchange got under Harris’ skin. When asked about it in a post-debate interview on CNN, she took a shot at Gabbard’s low standing in the race.
“This is going to sound immodest, but obviously I’m a top-tier candidate and so I did expect that I’d be on the stage and take some hits tonight,” Harris said. “When people are at 0 or 1% or whatever she might be at, so I did expect to take some hits tonight.”
The ‘I’m Speaking’ Moment with Pence
Harris knew that Vice President Mike Pence would try to interrupt her. Her debate team had carefully considered how she should react when it happened. But when the moment came, her response was not one that she and her aides had practiced during her days of preparation in Salt Lake City.
“Mr. Vice President, I’m speaking,” Harris told Pence curtly. “I’m speaking.”
It was a strong moment for her.
She seemed to know it, because she used the phrase twice more later in the debate when Pence tried talking over her.
It would be impossible to separate Harris’ forceful defense of her time to speak from the racial and gender politics of a Black woman being interrupted by a white man. The moment was something of a Rorschach test for millions of women and people of color who have found themselves interrupted or underestimated in professional or academic settings.
The main reason the Harris campaign wanted the debate Tuesday to feature unmuted microphones when the candidates were not speaking was its expectation that Trump would interrupt her and prompt a response similar to “I’m speaking.” With the microphones off for the candidate who is not speaking, it may be trickier for Harris to engineer an exchange in which Trump looks like a bully.
When Harris first introduced the “I’m speaking” line, it was during a discussion of the pandemic, which by the time of the vice presidential debate in October 2020 had killed more than 200,000 Americans. Harris said Pence and Trump had downplayed the seriousness of the public health risk to avoid inflaming the public.
After the exchange, two more similar ones took place later in the debate, when Pence tried interrupting Harris during a discussion about taxes and again about the Supreme Court. She cut him off both times with a curt “I’m speaking.”
By the time the debate ended, the Biden campaign had the “I’m speaking” slogan on campaign merchandise. When Harris was interrupted by protesters during her rallies last month, she used it again. It would not be surprising to hear it once more Tuesday night.
c.2024 The New York Times Company
