September 26, 2024 - 2:00am

“It was a normal interview,” Stephanie Ruhle insisted on Wednesday, having just demanded Kamala Harris confirm — on the record — she once worked at McDonald’s. It’s hard to argue the point.

Ruhle’s self-assessment came during an after-interview debrief with Chris Hayes, who congratulated his colleague on a “refreshingly substantive” discussion with the Vice President. Ruhle, selfless sentinel of Park Avenue, pierced straight to the heart of Harris’s bid with questions like, “For those who say ‘These policies aren’t for me,’ what do you say to them?” and “[Trump] said he will be the protector of women if elected, can you respond to that?”

To be sure, Ruhle tossed in some heat with references to the “tremendous economic wins” under Joe Biden and Harris. She agreed with Harris mid-interview on tariffs, affirming that Trump’s “plan is not serious when you lay it out like that.” Referencing poll results that show voters “still” trust Trump more on the economy, the MSNBC host wondered, “Why do you think that is?”

Harris is on track to give the media very few interviews throughout the course of her historically short campaign. It’s no coincidence the veep chose to sit down with Ruhle of all people just days after the MSNBC host made an explicit and impassioned case for Harris on “Real Time with Bill Maher.”

This is the strategy, and it’s honestly brilliant: why rock the boat by disrupting the wave of positive press and positive vibes it’s floating on? Interviews with media figures like Ruhle give the illusion of transparency without risking much. Sure, Ruhle — senior business analyst at NBC News — asked about some legitimately substantive topics like communities who feel they’re at “capacity” amid the immigration surge, why unions don’t seem to connect with Harris like Trump, and how Harris plans to “balance” hiking corporate tax rates without sending business out of the country. Her exchange on trade wasn’t awful, and she brought up the issue of “red tape” increasing housing costs in places like the suburbs of Pittsburgh.

But that was it. And while the topics may have been tough, the questions were softballs and the follow-ups were often non-existent. Even so, Harris missed some easy pitches, falling back into her old habits of pausing awkwardly and stumbling into nonsense.

“Can we trust you?” Ruhle asked Harris to end the chat. That question might have been better redirected at the interviewer. Unlike David Muir, Ruhle doesn’t exactly pretend to be Walter Cronkite. But if she and her colleagues want to wear the hat and waste the precious little time Harris gives journalists with gentle prodding and agreement — all while lamenting the decline of democratic norms and patting each other on the back — they should consider that might be why trust in media is at a historic low.


Emily Jashinsky is UnHerd‘s Washington D.C. Correspondent.

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