Kamala Harris is sharing her unfiltered thoughts on former president Joe Biden’s decision to seek reelection in 2024.
Biden left the race in July 2024 — just three months before the November election — after months of concern over his age and fitness for office, which spiked after his disastrous debate against Donald Trump in June 2024.
Harris subsequently became the Democratic frontrunner, launching a whirlwind 107-day campaign that ultimately ended with Trump’s reelection to office.
In her upcoming book, 107 Days, about her historic run for the White House, Harris said Biden’s decision to run again was “recklessness,” given the high stakes of the election.
In an excerpt obtained by the Atlantic, she concedes that “perhaps” she should have spoken up and told Biden not to run amid growing concerns about his ability to serve another term. “But the American people had chosen him before in the same matchup,” she shared. “Maybe he was right to believe that they would do so again.”
Harris also said that advising him to drop out would have looked “incredibly self-serving” to Biden: “He would see it as naked ambition, perhaps as poisonous disloyalty, even if my only message was: Don’t let the other guy win.”
According to Harris, she and the people around Biden felt the decision to run for office was “Joe and Jill’s decision.” In hindsight, she realizes that wasn’t the wisest call. “I think it was recklessness,” she wrote. “The stakes were simply too high. This wasn’t a choice that should have been left to an individual’s ego, an individual’s ambition. It should have been more than a personal decision.”
Still, Harris made it clear that she didn’t think Biden was physically and mentally unfit to serve. She stated, “On his worst day, he was more deeply knowledgeable, more capable of exercising judgment, and far more compassionate than Donald Trump on his best. But at 81, Joe got tired.”
“That’s when his age showed in physical and verbal stumbles,” Harris continued. “I don’t think it’s any surprise that the debate debacle happened right after two back-to-back trips to Europe and a flight to the West Coast for a Hollywood fundraiser.” She said that if she believed that Biden couldn’t be president, “I would have said so. As loyal as I am to President Biden, I am more loyal to my country.”
Harris went on to detail other issues she experienced during her time spent alongside Biden, including the “untrue attacks” about her work and her character — and the underwhelming response from members of Biden’s team. She pointed to Fox News’s alleged attacks on her laugh and their claims that she was a “DEI hire,” among other things, and said that “the White House rarely pushed back.”
“They had a huge comms team; they had Karine Jean-Pierre briefing in the pressroom every day. But getting anything positive said about my work or any defense against untrue attacks was almost impossible.”
“Worse, I often learned that the president’s staff was adding fuel to negative narratives that sprang up around me,” Harris added. “And when the stories were unfair or inaccurate, the president’s inner circle seemed fine with it. Indeed, it seemed as if they decided I should be knocked down a little bit more.”
Harris posited this was because they didn’t want her taking attention away from or outshining Biden. She said, “Their thinking was zero-sum: If she’s shining, he’s dimmed. None of them grasped that if I did well, he did well. That given the concerns about his age, my visible success as his vice president was vital. It would serve as a testament to his judgment in choosing me and reassurance that if something happened, the country was in good hands. My success was important for him. His team didn’t get it.”
BuzzFeed has contacted reps for Biden for comment. Until then, you can read the rest of the excerpts here and check out 107 Days when it releases on Sept. 23.