US Vice President Kamala Harris is having a bad year, with poll numbers lower than predecessors Dick Cheney, who accidentally shot a man in the face, and Dan Quayle, who became embroiled in a feud with a fictional character.
When Mr Cheney was George Bush's second-in-command, he shot Harry Whittington in the face with a 28-gauge shotgun during a Texas hunting expedition. While campaigning for his second term under George HW Bush, Mr Quayle said in a speech that Murphy Brown, a television character played by Candice Bergen, was “mocking the importance of fathers by bearing a child alone and calling it another liberal ‘lifestyle choice'."
But though Ms Harris has yet to commit any such gaffes, she has shattered a glass ceiling — and is now expected to walk through the shards raining down upon her.
She is the first woman to serve as vice president as well as the first black and South Asian person to hold the office.
A former California senator and state attorney general, Ms Harris proved her willingness to be tough, often making decisions for the greater good, regardless of how popular it made her.
Prayers for Kamala Harris in her ancestral Indian village
After the 2008 foreclosure crisis that burst the housing bubble, several states sued lenders for their predatory practices. When a $4 billion settlement was offered, Ms Harris was the only attorney general to baulk, saying the amount was too low — for which she was criticised.
Her strategy and refusal to back down added another $16bn to the settlement as well as more protections for California homeowners, a move that made her quite popular in a state that helped deliver President Joe Biden 55 electoral votes.
It also gave Mr Biden the confidence to throw her into the deep end, handing over tough issues such as immigration, election reform and climate change. And eat-their-own-Democrats and a hungry-for-scandal media seem to content to scrutinise her every move.
When he was vice president, Mr Biden was known for going off message and making off-colour comments into hot mics — such as when former president Barack Obama signed the Affordable Care Act into law and Mr Biden leaned in to say: “This is a big [expletive] deal”. Or when, at a White House holiday event, he produced a flask and said that “Uncle Joe” would handle the eggnog.
His “fun uncle” tactics resulted in a series of whimsical memes, with Mr Obama delivering a straight line and Mr Biden coming in with the zinger.
Ms Harris, however, came into office with very little to laugh at: a worldwide pandemic, a financial crisis, an insurrection, a stacked Supreme Court and what some have called an assault on women’s rights.
One need look no further than her first overseas trip to spot the disparities in media coverage as well as optics. While in Central America, known for its political corruption, violence and poverty, Ms Harris was lambasted by progressives and the media for telling those hoping to cross the US border illegally: “Do not come.”
The comment was made in response to a sharp rise in illegal crossings at the US-Mexico border, with US Customs and Border Patrol reporting a record-breaking 1.6 million encounters with migrants in 2021, a result of the pandemic, gang violence, job losses and catastrophic natural disasters across Central America and the Caribbean.
With US hospitals filled to the brink due to Covid-19 and with the country reeling from its own natural disasters, the decision to walk back an open-door policy until these issues can be mitigated seems a wise a choice — but few Democrats appear willing to voice such an opinion.
By comparison, Mr Biden’s first overseas trip to Germany was a breeze in and out of friendly territory, among leaders he has known for years.
“It was a much tougher task. She walked into the lion’s den, whereas he walked into a clubhouse with some of his best mates,” Ivo Daalder, the Obama administration’s ambassador to Nato, told The Los Angeles Times.
“It would have been difficult for Biden to make a misstep … He was sending a message: ‘We love you.’”
The year of walking away
In the year nicknamed the Great Resignation, the Washington rumour mill has been happy to churn out theories regarding the exodus of several of the vice president's staff. The message out of the Old Executive Offices is that staffers are complaining about a lack of focus on the agenda, CNN reported.
Earlier this year, the US Bureau of Labour Statistics announced that 4.3 million Americans, or 2.9 per cent of the entire workforce, quit their jobs in August, breaking the record set the previous month.
The average White House employee lasts about two years, despite what The West Wing might depict. What creator Aaron Sorkin does get right is the expectation that employees give over family and social agendas, with spouses of staffers often referring to themselves as “single parents".
Many on Ms Harris’s team, however, have been working with her either in California or on the campaign trail for several years.
Lean on me
Mr Biden has also been leaning heavily on Ms Harris to stump for the administration’s Build Back Better agenda, which contains many key ingredients addressing climate change. Now that Joe Manchin, a senator from West Virginia, is effectively holding the legislation hostage, all those good intentions and air miles may result in producing only hot air.
In a recent appearance on Comedy Central's Tha God's Honest Truth, host Charlamagne Tha God baited Ms Harris with a provocative a question about Mr Manchin.
“I want to know who the real president of this country is: is it Joe Biden or Joe Manchin?” he asked.
Her pointed response gave assurance that she has the president's back.
“It’s Joe Biden, and don’t start talking like a Republican, about asking whether or not he’s president,” she said. “I hear the frustration, but let’s not deny the impact that we’ve had and agree also that there is a whole lot more work to be done.”
Her tone was notably stronger as she deviated from her usual on-message public voice, which Charlamagne made note of.
“That Kamala Harris? That’s the one I like,” the host said. “That’s the one I’d like to see out here more often in these streets.”
