Vice President Harris told me in a backstage interview for ‘Axios on HBO’ that the Trump administration had ‘no stock’ of vaccines when he left office.
The whole picture: “There was no national strategy or plan for vaccinations, we left it to the states and local leaders to try to find out,” Harris told me in the White House after hosting a virtual COVID event with African-American mayors led.
- “In many ways, we start from scratch with something that has been raging for almost a whole year.”
Harris said she constantly puts her team on the question, “Can we do more? Where is the capacity to do more?”
- “The suffering,” she said, “is so great in terms of the public health crisis, the number of people who died, the number of people who got it and the economic crisis.”
- “So we are in the midst of a hurricane that is still raging, which requires us – each of us in a position of leadership – to constantly ask, ‘Are we doing enough?’
- “We have to find a way – it has to be our standard. Our standard has to be: ‘Anything is possible, but we’ll have to work like a hater to get it done.’ Which means … no patience for delay, no patience for ‘it can not be done’. You know, that’s how I feel about it. ‘
Asked what her signature issue would be, Harris said with a laugh, “To make sure Joe Biden is a success.”
- I asked her with the trademark question of the late Mayor of New York, Ed Koch: “How are I?”
- “It’s three weeks in,” Harris replied laughing. “Give me a chance!”
When Harris left, I asked her if her predecessor, Vice President Mike Pence, had left a note for her.
- She said he did have it, but left the details as a wreath hanger.
- I’m told Pence left the note in the Vice President’s West Wing office. It was Midwestern-friendly: he said it was the honor of a lifetime to serve in the post – and wished Harris the best for her own success.