The Harris 'Prevent Defense Campaign' with the Press, and Why This Former Journalist Doesn't Think It Will Work.

Michael Smerconish, well known radio commentator and host of the Saturday CNN program ‘Smerconish’, puts out a daily poll for his listeners.? One recent one asked them who needs a second debate more, Donald Trump or Kamala Harris? Respondents voted Trump, but Michael said his instincts told him it was Harris.? As I thought about it, I came to believe that he was correct.? Here’s why.

I covered politics as a journalist for decades, but neither I nor anyone else has ever seen a candidacy like the Harris campaign.? Nominated for president without a single vote, she is now avoiding press conferences or potentially difficult media interviews.? Her policy positions are vague as if her biggest goal isn’t getting new voters as it is not losing the ones she already has.? Tom Bevan, CEO of Real Clear Politics uses a football analogy to describe it, calling it her ‘prevent defense’, a tactic used by teams when they are well ahead in the game.

The problem is that polls show she isn’t well ahead.? I would even argue that the evidence suggests that she’s behind.

In 2016, Donald Trump defeated Hillary Clinton by a stunning margin of 304 to 227 in the Electoral College despite losing the popular vote.? It wasn’t even close.

Looking at how Harris is polling now compared to Clinton and Biden in 2016 and 2020 against Trump as measured by Real Clear Politics, and then comparing them to the actual election results, I calculate that Trump would theoretically get 306 electoral votes this time.

Sure it's conjecture, but it’s no secret that Trump voters have always been difficult to poll.? In 2020, there were states like Wisconsin were Biden had substantial leads over Trump in the polls only to see those lead evaporate into nail biters on election day.? Harris is polling better than Biden was earlier in the race, but losing by less doesn’t get you much.

So why the prevent defense? Harris wants a debate because she believes she can beat Trump there. Harris doesn't want interviews because she believes she cannot there.

I’ll admit I have an ulterior motive in asking.? I spent decades trying to do impactful, aggressive journalism.? I think America benefits when today’s journalists do the same.? I want to see a robust news media asking tough questions to candidates who seek public office.? That’s not happening, and I think the Harris campaign’s tactics are exposing just how irrelevant they feel journalism has become in America today. They see no downside for them in avoiding reporters' questions.

As a voter, I also want to know what the candidates will do once in office.? I think I have the right to that information.? Harris and some in the media disagree.? Speaking on ‘Real Time with Bill Maher’, MSNBC reporter Stephanie Ruhle said in support the Harris campaign’s tactics, "Kamala Harris is not running for perfection. She's running against Trump. We have two choices. And so there are some things you might not know her answer to. And in 2024, unlike 2016 for a lot of the American people, we know exactly what Trump will do, who he is, and the kind of threat he is to democracy.”? Those are the words of an advocate for Harris, not voters.

Ruhle would be chosen to do the first one-on-one national interview with Harris a few days later, asking predictable questions and inserting random remarks such as telling Harris, “You have laid out policy in great detail.”? Harris has laid out some of what she wants to do, but virtually nothing on how she'll do it. Can someone please fact check the questioner?

Here is how it is supposed to work.

In 1961, days after a failed CIA plot to overthrow Cuban Dictator Fidel Castro called the Bay of Pigs, the new President John F. Kennedy started a news conference by telling reporters he had nothing more to say about it other than a statement he had put out earlier. That's when renown reporter Sander Vanocur asked one of the best questions I have ever heard at a presidential news conference, complaining to Kennedy that reporters had been shut out from lines of communication with the State Department and White House since the crisis happened. Perhaps realizing that his position was untenable, Kennedy caved and told him in a somewhat halting response that press briefings on the Bay of Pigs would begin the next day. You could visibly tell that Kennedy did not want to be put in that position, but to his credit, he understood one of the obligations of the presidency was to communicate to Americans by taking tough questions from the press, especially in times of crisis.

Should Harris be elected, how would she respond in a similar crisis? Would she do as Kennedy did and hold a news conference and do media interviews, or would she avoid the press and shut down lines of communication as Kennedy had attempted to do at first? The crazy thing for me is that I have no idea what the answer to that question is.

My next post will be the ten questions Stephanie Ruhle didn’t ask Harris that I would have given the chance.