Kamala Harris spars with Fox News anchor in testy interview

Vice President Kamala Harris turned questions about her nearly four years in office into attacks on Republican rival Donald Trump’s record in a heated interview Wednesday on Fox News, her first appearance on the conservative network, as she courts disaffected Republican and independent voters.

Pressed on border crossings and violent crimes committed by undocumented immigrants during Joe Biden’s presidency, Harris repeatedly hammered Trump for opposing a bipartisan border security bill earlier this year. Asked about Biden’s mental acuity, she called Trump “unstable” and said “we should all be concerned.”

Harris also accused Fox News of whitewashing Trump’s most incendiary rhetoric, including the former president calling political rivals “the enemy within.”

“Here’s the bottom line: He has repeated it many times, and you and I both know that. And you and I both know that he has talked about turning the American military on the American people. He has talked about going after people who are engaged in peaceful protest. He has talked about locking people up because they disagree with him,” a feisty Harris said after Fox News anchor Bret Baier played a clip of Trump complaining about political persecution.

“This is a democracy,” she said. “And in a democracy, the president of the United States – in the United States of America – should be willing to be able to handle criticism without saying he would lock people up for doing it.”

The interview came as Harris seeks to appeal to small slivers of undecided voters who have supported Republicans in the past but are uneasy with Trump. Her campaign has targeted those voters in recent days – with the vice president campaigning alongside former Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney, veterans of Trump’s administration and others in the party who split with the former president over his attempts to overturn the 2020 election.