Harris, Walz Agree to First Interview Since Launching Campaign

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The interview will mark Harris’ first extended, nonscripted exchange with the media since she launched her presidential campaign on July 21.

One week after giving her nomination acceptance speech on the closing day of the 2024 Democratic National Convention, Vice President Kamala Harris will be joined by Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz on Aug. 29 for their first joint interview as candidates.

The CNN interview will be conducted by Dana Bash, the network’s chief political correspondent and anchor, at 9 p.m. ET on Thursday. Harris and Walz are hitting the campaign trail this week on a bus tour that will take them through Georgia, a key battleground state in the fight for the Electoral College.

The unscripted exchange will be the first time Harris has sat with the media for an interview since President Joe Biden exited the race on July 21 and endorsed her as his successor.

Harris has moved fast in the 37 days since launching her campaign, facing a considerably shortened window of time to define herself and her platform, while seeking inroads with voters outside the Democratic Party’s base.

Republicans, including former President Donald Trump’s running mate, Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), have criticized Harris for not taking extended interviews with the press, instead only giving limited gaggles with reporters during campaign travel.

During an Aug. 6 campaign stop in Philadelphia, Vance said, “For the past 16 days and counting, the American media has been unable to ask [Harris] a question.”

Trump and Vance have held multiple interviews and press conferences since the senator was elevated to the top of the Republican ticket at the party’s July convention.

“I think it’s really disgraceful, both for Kamala Harris but also for a lot of the American media that participates in this stuff, to have a person who has been the presumptive nominee of the Democrat Party for 17 days and refuses to take a single question from the American media,” Vance said during an early August campaign stop in Wisconsin.

Harris had said earlier this month that she would conduct a sit-down interview before the end of August, with the CNN conversation fulfilling that promise. Her campaign also said this week that she is actively preparing for her first interview with her Republican opponent, Trump, which will be hosted on ABC from Philadelphia on Sept. 10.

After seeing a slight boost in some national and battleground state polls following last week’s convention in Chicago, Harris is trying to thread the needle in what is seen as one of the briefest major-party political campaigns in modern history. As of Aug. 27, her website still lacks a concrete platform, with many of her proposals coming in speeches and staff responses to press inquiries.

Harris has pushed for abortion access and reproductive rights, gun control, voting rights, immigration reform, border security, middle-class tax cuts and child tax credits, price gouging bans, and housing affordability in her recent proposals.

The interview with Bash will be Harris’ first opportunity to discuss these plans with the media in an extended format since becoming the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee earlier this month.

The vice president previously gave an interview to The Nation in June.