Harris campaign leaders blame abbreviated campaign and headwinds for loss

By Gregory Krieg and Jeff Zeleny, CNN

(CNN) — A brief campaign born in a political firestorm weeks before the party’s national convention. A news media that held Kamala Harris to a higher standard than Donald Trump. A hurricane that “f**ked up” two weeks of campaigning.

The leaders of Harris’ presidential campaign in an interview released Tuesday defended their decisions and blamed a variety of external factors for the Democrat’s defeat three weeks ago.

“There was a price to be paid for the short campaign,” said David Plouffe, a senior adviser to Harris, who became the Democratic presidential nominee over the summer after President Joe Biden dropped out of the race.

Three weeks after the election, Plouffe and three other Harris advisers spoke out for the first time on the liberal podcast, “Pod Save America.” They said a 107-day campaign did not give Harris time to distinguish herself from Biden and craft a message that could warm up a cold political climate for Democrats. Harris’ top aides did not reveal any notable regrets and suggested that, with more time, the vice president might have fared better.

“In a 107-day race, it was difficult to do what we had to do,” said Jennifer O’Malley Dillon, the campaign chair, who pushed back against critics’ claims that they spent too much time attacking Trump and warning voters about what his second term might bring, and not enough making a positive case for Harris.

“This idea that people have a well-constructed, already baked-in idea about Trump and don’t need to learn anymore,” Dillon said, “it’s a complete fallacy.”

None of the campaign brass called out Biden by name, but they repeatedly referred to political “headwinds” and touted how much Harris needed to claw back just to make the race competitive.

“Every time she talked to a voter, every time she was out on the stump, she really leaned into her own vision. But the headwinds were tough,” Dillon said. “Where she campaigned, we did way better than the rest of the country.”

Harris herself also spoke about the race on Tuesday during a call with grassroots supporters. Though she seemed less inclined to pass along the blame, the vice president also suggested the short campaign hamstrung her chances.

“The outcome of this election, obviously, is not what we wanted. It is not what we worked so hard for, but I am proud of the race we ran, and your role in this was critical,” Harris said. “What we did in 107 days was unprecedented.”

On “Pod Saves America,” campaign leaders also dismissed suggestions that they should have directly responded to Trump’s withering attack ad over transgender rights, which closed with the memorable line: “Kamala is for they/them. President Trump is for you.” The spot used Harris’ own words, highlighting support for taxpayer-funded sex reassignment surgeries for transgender prisoners.

“If there’s a belief that if only we had responded to this trans ad with national and huge battleground state ads we would have won,” Plouffe said. “I don’t think that’s true.”

Quentin Fulks, a deputy campaign manager, acknowledged the ad’s usefulness to Trump.

“Obviously, it was a very effective ad at the end,” Fulks said. “I think that it made her seem out of touch.”

Yet the architects of the Harris campaign dismissed suggestions that some Democrats have made since the election that not responding to the ad played a major role in Harris’ defeat. The advisers said they tested several response ads, but none were seen in focus groups as particularly effective.

“We took it very seriously,” Plouffe said, adding that it did not determine the election. “This was not driving voter behavior, like the economy.”

In a wide-ranging conversation with podcast host Dan Pfeiffer, a former adviser to Barack Obama, the Harris aides defended the strategic decisions they made on the campaign, including extensive outreach to moderate Republicans in the final weeks of the race.

“You want to maximize your base, of course. And that was a place where we spent enormous time, a lot of resources. That’s critical,” Plouffe said. “You’ve got to couple that with dominating in the middle. Not just winning it a little. We have to dominate the moderate vote.”

Stephanie Cutter, another senior adviser to Harris, said the vice president was “ready and willing to go on Joe Rogan,” the popular podcast that Trump ultimately appeared on and earned the host’s endorsement. She said they couldn’t reach an agreement on scheduling.

“Would it have changed anything?” Cutter said. “It would have broken through, not because of the conversation with Joe Rogan, but the fact that she was doing it.”

Cutter and Dillon also ripped the “traditional media” for not putting more pressure on Trump to sit down for a serious policy interview.

“Trump did none” of those things, Cutter said. “Literally none,” Pfeiffer added.

Dillon finished the thought: “And got no sh*t for that.”

“We got tons of sh*t that she wasn’t doing enough media,” Cutter said.

They also criticized reporters for asking Harris, during her handful of big ticket interviews, what they described as lazy or disconnected questions.

“We would do an interview and to Stephanie’s point, the questions were small and process-y,” Dillon said.

“Dumb,” Cutter said. “Just dumb.”

“They were not informing a voter who was trying to listen to learn more or to understand,” Dillon said.

CNN’s Ebony Davis contributed to this report.

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