Fox News anchor Bret Baier broke down national media coverage of Joe Biden’s decision to choose Sen. Kamala Harris as his running mate, saying outlets grew warmer to her as Biden’s pick rather than a candidate for the Democratic nomination herself.
“I think there is some forgetfulness, maybe purposefully, to Kamala Harris’s campaign. These same folks covered that,” Baier said Wednesday on Fox News’s Outnumbered. “Remember that Sen. Harris got out of the presidential campaign Dec. 3, 2019. She didn’t make it to Christmas. That’s two months before the Iowa caucuses.”
The host of Fox News’s leading evening news program, Special Report, Baier said the job of the national press is “to be fair and to be fair to both sides” in all situations.
The context surrounding Harris’s decision to drop out of the Democratic primary in December should not be forgotten, he said.
“She got out because she was considered not a good campaigner and she didn’t raise any money,” Baier explained. “Now, to hear some in the media say that she’s an amazing retail campaigner and she had this magnetism that drew people to her, I just think disregards how the campaign ended.”
In announcing Harris as his running mate on Tuesday, Biden said he chose the former California attorney general because she is “ready to lead on day one.”
“The first Black and Indian American woman to represent California in the United States Senate, Kamala Harris grew up believing in the promise of America and fighting to make sure that promise is fulfilled for all Americans,” Biden said.
Detractors of Biden’s decision have pointed to Harris’s grilling of the former vice president over his embracing of segregationist policies during his own stint in the Senate and stances on abortion.
“One of the reasons that surprised me, she was very — she was probably nastier than even Pocahontas to Joe Biden,” President Trump said in reaction to Biden’s selection of Harris. “She was very disrespectful to Joe Biden, and it’s hard to pick somebody that’s that disrespectful.”
Conservative commentators have pointed to how the nation’s largest newspapers and television networks have covered Biden’s announcement, saying their analysis of what Harris brings to the Democratic ticket is overblown.
I think they like it. pic.twitter.com/muR2QFRj1q
— Byron York (@ByronYork) August 12, 2020
compare and contrast https://t.co/O4Tll0B0fq pic.twitter.com/vOzmFtWCue
— Guy Benson (@guypbenson) August 12, 2020
Baier, considered one of the most ethically sound and fair anchors in Washington, D.C., said Harris’s legal background and dogged attacks on Trump made her an apt choice for Biden regardless of any narrative national media puts forth about her popularity.
“She can be a very effective prosecutor, as I mentioned, in committee hearings. She can take the fight to Donald Trump, which is what I think the Biden campaign wants her to do,” he said. “But to kind of re-picture her presidential campaign is a little disingenuous.”
