After Trump faced a grilling from the organization, Vice President Kamala Harris sat down for an interview with the National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ) on Tuesday where she was asked about how important joy is to her 2024 presidential campaign.
Harris fielded questions from Politico’s Eugene Daniels, WHYY’s Tonya Mosley and TheGrio’s Gerren Keith Gaynor during an event organized by the NABJ in Philadelphia. The vice president, who has done one primetime sit-down interview since launching her presidential campaign, faced a friendlier NABJ panel than the former president as she spoke about the element of joy in her campaign and her plan to ban assault weapons. (RELATED: ‘I Didn’t Know She Was Black’: Trump Takes Shot At Kamala Harris When Asked If She Was On The Ticket Due To Race)
“Joyful warrior has been used to describe your campaign and your opponent and Republicans have at times weaponized you laughing in campaign ads for example. Why is joy important to you to insert into this election and what do you make of Republicans using that as a way to suggest that you’re not a serious candidate?” Gaynor asked the vice president.
“Oh, sometimes I think, and I’ll say to whoever the young people are who are watching this. There’s some times when your adversaries will try to turn your strength into a weakness. Don’t you let them. Don’t you let them,” Harris began.
“I find joy in the American people. I find joy in optimism, in what I see to be our future and our ability to invest in it. I find joy in the ambition of people. I find joy in the dreams of the people. I find joy in building community. I find joy in building coalitions. I find joy in believing that the true measure of the strength of the leader is not based on who you beat down but who you lift up. And I think we should all find joy and have a sense of optimism about who we are as Americans and what we mean to each other and what we can do to lift each other up,” the vice president finished.
Before answering questions about her “joyful” campaign, Harris faced questions on abortion access, her Middle East policy and Springfield, Ohio. The only testy moment of the interview came when the vice president was pushed on whether she would ban handguns.
“You said you support an assault weapons ban and universal background checks and we actually learned during the debate that you are a gun owner. But in Philadelphia, handguns are responsible for most homicides and violent crime,” Mosley began.
“How will you address the issue of the use of handguns because a push for an assault weapons ban only addresses a significant but small part of the problem?” Mosley continued.
The vice president began by explaining that she did not want to take away Americans’ guns but she did want to ban assault weapons. Mosley repeatedly tried to interject to press the vice president further and specify that she was talking about handguns, not assault weapons or universal background checks.
“I’m asking specifically about handguns, because many of those handguns are purchased in places —” Mosley interjected.
“Universal background checks apply to handguns. They do,” Harris said over Mosley.
Harris’ friendly interview with the NABJ stood in stark contrast to Trump’s appearance in July. Both Harris and Trump were invited to the NABJ’s conference in July but only the former president was able to make the in-person trip.
ABC News’ Rachel Scott kicked off the interview session with Trump, immediately pressing the former president on his “false claims” about his “rivals.” Scott continued on to say that Trump had “attacked black journalists” and spent 35 seconds laying out the former president’s past statements.
“I don’t think I’ve ever been asked a question in such a horrible manner,” Trump responded. “You don’t even say ‘hello, how are you.’ Are you with ABC? Because I think they’re a fake news network, a terrible network.”
“I think it’s disgraceful,” he added.
Tensions remained high further into the interview as the former president began to spar with an audience member on whether Scott’s line of questioning was rude.
“If I came onto a stage like this and I got treated so rudely as this woman treated me, and I’m fine with it …”
“No she did not!” the audience member shouted.
‘No she did not!’: Trump spars with an audience member at the NABJ24 Conference over whether or not ABC’s Rachel Scott was being rude to him pic.twitter.com/4MdYnNT5KM
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) July 31, 2024
“She was very rude sir, very rude. That was a nasty … that wasn’t a question. She didn’t ask me a question. She gave a statement. That wasn’t a question,” Trump shot back at the audience member.
