Kamala Harris insisted on Thursday that her “values had not changed” when asked in her first major interview since becoming the Democratic presidential nominee why she’s shifted some of her positions on fracking and immigration.
She also insisted she would govern for all Americans if she won November’s election and promised to name a Republican to serve in her cabinet if elected.
In a clip released ahead of her pre-recorded interview with CNN’s Dana Bash that is being broadcast later Thursday, Harris was asked whether voters should “feel comfortable and confident that what you’re saying now is going to be your policy moving forward”.
The question comes after her Republican rival, Donald Trump, had pointed to 2019 comments from Harris about banning fracking, which she now says she would not do if she becomes president.
Asked about policy changes on Thursday, Harris responded: “I think the most important and most significant aspect of my policy perspective and decisions is my values have not changed.
“You mentioned the Green New Deal. I have always believed – and I have worked on it – that the climate crisis is real, that it is an urgent matter to which we should apply metrics that include holding ourselves to deadlines around time.”
Harris, who is being interviewed with her running mate, Tim Walz, was also asked about changing policy stances around decriminalizing illegal migrant crossings at he the border.
She said: “My value around what we need to do to secure our border, that value has not changed. I spent two terms as the attorney general of California prosecuting transnational criminal organizations, violations of American laws regarding the illegal passage of guns, drugs and human beings across our border. My values have not changed.”
The interview is being seen as a key test of her credibility after a prolonged honeymoon that has seen her surge ahead of Donald Trump in opinion polls.
It comes following some criticism of Harris’s reluctance to expose herself to media scrutiny following her ascent to the top of the Democratic ticket last month in place of Joe Biden, who withdrew from the race on 21 July.
The US vice-president, who has had a variable performance in past televised one-on-ones, had previously pledged to hold a major interview before the end of August.
The CNN date sees her make good on that pledge with two days to spare.
The terms of her engagement have drawn mockery from Republicans, who have accused Harris of being unwilling to risk a high-profile grilling without the protective presence of Walz, the Minnesota governor who has cultivated a plain-speaking, everyman image.
“Kamala needs to do a live, unedited, solo press conference,” Abigail Jackson, communications director for Josh Hawley, the rightwing Missouri senator, posted on X. “She wants to be commander-in-chief and she’s too scared to do an interview without Tim Walz by her side? Girl power, amirite.”
Others have pointed out that it’s customary for presidential candidates to do interviews with their running mate.
The interview, to take place in the historic southern city of Savannah during a two-day campaign swing through Georgia – a vital swing state – is expected to focus in part on Harris’s policy positions, which have been criticised in some quarters as both vague and for representing a departure from the more liberal stances she assumed in her unsuccessful bid for the Democratic nomination in 2020.
The choice of CNN as the outlet and Bash as interviewer has also been criticised by Trump supporters, who claim both are sympathetic to Democrats and unlikely to pose hard questions. The network hosted the 27 June presidential debate – with Bash acting as a co-moderator with her colleague Jake Tapper – that prompted Biden’s eventual exit from the race following a dire performance.
Harris’s ability to cope with rigorous interviews was questioned following a bruising encounter with NBC’s Lester Holt in 2021, when she displayed annoyance over being asked why she had not visited the southern US border in her vice-presidential brief to discover the underlying causes of illegal migration.
Her delay in facing interviews has contrasted with Trump, who has staged a rash of recent media appearances, even calling up Fox News and Newsmax, two of his favourite outlets, to voice live, on-air criticisms of Harris’s acceptance speech at the Democratic national convention last week.
• This article was amended on 30 August 2024. Kamala Harris’s 2021 interview with Lester Holt was broadcast on NBC, not ABC as an earlier version said.
