Feisty Kamala puts the joy to one side for her lion’s den showdown

The Fox News interview was the biggest gamble of Kamal Harris’s campaign

At last we have seen the feisty side of Kamala Harris. Her interview on the conservative citadel of Fox News forced her to ditch her “joyous” persona for that of a street fighter in order to survive the barrage of hostile questions from Fox anchor Bret Baier.

It was gripping combat, unlike anything we have seen in this campaign so far, and it will have pleased the Harris and the Trump camps for different reasons.

For Harris, the interview was the biggest gamble of her campaign, placing her in a prime-time spotlight at a network unashamedly hostile to her presidential bid.

At a time when polls across the country have her deadlocked with Donald Trump, her appearance on Fox gave her access to a huge audience that rarely hears blunt criticism of the former president and directly from her. Her target was to win over moderate conservatives, especially women, who may not like her much but are wary of putting Trump back into the White House.

Baier assumed the role of chief protagonist, grilling Harris repeatedly about border security and the economy – which polls say are her Achilles heel with Trump supporters.

Baier made no attempt to broaden the interview to other key campaign issues, including ones which play well for Harris like abortion and healthcare, and he asked no questions about Ukraine, China or Gaza.

As such, it was easily the toughest 30 minutes of Harris’s campaign and the Vice-President initially appeared to be surprised by Baier’s repeated tactic of talking over her and not allowing her to answer properly. But then Harris changed gear and became more aggressive and assertive, ­ignoring Baier’s interruptions to attack Trump as “dangerous”, “unfit” and “unstable”.

Her most effective moments were when she named the many former Trump administration officials who have said he was unfit to serve as president.

We learned several new things during the 30-minute slugfest. We learned that Harris will never concede publicly that the Biden administration failed on border security in its first three years in office. The argument she will take to the polls is that the immigration system has been broken for decades and that Trump bears blame for effectively killing the tough bipartisan border security bill proposed by the Democrats earlier this year. Harris argues that she has moved to the centre on the issue and will be tougher on border security than Biden. The question is whether her 11th-hour makeover on ­border security will be enough to win over voters.

Harris also used the interview to create more distance between herself and Biden after she drew criticism last week for claiming she could not think of any areas of difference between herself and her president. This time Harris stated: “Let me be very clear, my presidency will not be a continuation of Joe Biden’s presidency.”

She also effectively dodged questions about Biden’s cognitive decline, twisting the narrative back to Trump’s fitness to serve.

Harris tried to explain away polls showing voters trust Trump more than her on the economy by pointing out surveys of leading economists who say her policies will be better for inflation and the deficit than those of Trump.

In the end, this heated interview delivered something for both sides. For the Trump camp, it put Harris on the spot in a way she has not been before over her two key perceived weaknesses on border security and the economy. Trump will be hoping this only cements voter doubts about her on these issues.

But for the Harris camp, it revealed the feisty, pugnacious and unscripted side of the Vice-President for the first time – in complete contrast to the upbeat, smiling, soundbite Harris we see during her stump speeches. Her shots at Trump were well targeted and robust and while they were delivered to an audience that will mostly dismiss them, Harris will hope that they will influence the small numbers of undecided voters who could prove decisive in next month’s poll.

Whether the emergence of “feisty Kamala” makes any difference in this race remains to be seen, but at this stage of the campaign it is unlikely to hurt her.