Kamala Harris didn’t spend a lot of time talking to the media during her 107-day run for president, but one of the defining moments of her failed campaign came when she couldn’t answer a simple question – first from the ladies of The View and then from Stephen Colbert – about how she would differentiate herself from Joe Biden.
In fact, the then-Democrat nominee’s answer to Colbert was so incoherent, Megyn deemed it a “brain glitch” at the time. Here’s how it went back in October 2024:
COLBERT: Polling shows that a lot of people, especially independent voters, really want this to be a ‘change’ election and that they tend to break for you in terms of thinking about change. You are a member of the present administration. Under a Harris administration, what would the major changes be and what would stay the same?
HARRIS: Sure. Well, I mean, I’m obviously not Joe Biden–
COLBERT: I noticed. [audience laughs]
HARRIS: –So, that would be one change. [audience laughs] But also I think it’s important to say with, you know, 28 days to go, I’m not Donald Trump. And so when we think about the significance of what this next generation of leadership looks like where I would be elected president, it is about, frankly– I, I, I love the American people and I, I believe in our country. I, I love that it was our character and nature to be an ambitious people. You know, we have aspirations, we have dreams, we have incredible work ethic, and, and I just believe that we can create and, and build upon the success we’ve achieved in a way that we continue to grow opportunity and, in that way, growth strength of our nation.
Ten months have passed since the ill-fated moment, but it appears as though not much has changed. Harris was back on the Colbert couch Friday night, received virtually the same question from the late-night host, and had all but the same thought malfunction during her response.
On Monday’s show, Megyn was joined by Michael Knowles, host of The Michael Knowles Show, to discuss the bizarre interview and Harris’ return to the national stage.
The Latest ‘Glitch’
Right after Harris awkwardly announced her forthcoming memoir about her failed presidential campaign, she stopped by The Late Show in an apparent effort to promote it (though the fact that Colbert was just cancelled due to financial issues tied, at least in part, to declining viewership would lead one to wonder whether that was the best place for her to hawk pre-sales).
She giggled her way through a nonsensical “tease” about how her husband Doug Emhoff seemingly failed to buy her a birthday gift at the height of the campaign and defended her use of wired headphones in a way only Kamala Harris can. But it was her answer to Colbert’s repeat question about separating herself from the Biden White House that really drove home just how little has changed.
“So, then you go to run for president yourself and people are asking you to separate yourself from Joe Biden. People are asking over and over again, I was one of them, ‘What’s different between you and Joe Biden,'” Colbert said. “That must have been difficult because you have to differentiate yourself as a candidate, and yet you respect this man who you’re still working for at the same time. What was that like to navigate?”
Rather than learn from her past mistakes and come prepared with a coherent answer to the question she has, by Colbert’s own admission, fielded countless times, Harris first tried to filibuster.
HARRIS: I talk about that extensively in the book.
COLBERT: It’s in the chapter with Doug [audience laughs]
HARRIS: No, it’s because– and I say that because you’re raising something that you and I both know is, requires a lot of, a lot more time than we probably have right now to talk about–
COLBERT [to audience]: Are we in a hurry, guys?
AUDIENCE: No.
COLBERT: Go ahead, go ahead.
HARRIS [giggling]: Thanks, guys.
COLBERT: Go ahead.
And then the “brain glitch” returned. The former vice president took a very long pause before launching into her next thought. “I feel very strongly that,” she began before trailing off again. Finally, she offered up the closest thing to an answer she could muster.
“I mean, it’s an instinct of mine to be um someone who does not participate in piling on,” Harris added. “And I was not going to pile on. And I just wasn’t going to do that. And there was a lot of piling on at that time, and I wasn’t going to participate in that.”
At that point, Colbert stepped in to change the subject to when she apparently “pile[d] on” Donald Trump during their September 2024 debate.
Same Old Kamala
Megyn said watching Harris fumble her way through the questions was like déjà vu. “You can see when she glitches. It’s a long pause – awkwardly long – and then back to ‘I’ and ‘me,'” she noted. “It’s always ‘I’ and ‘me.’ That’s where she is most comfortable. ‘I have this policy.’ ‘I have this thing about piling on.’ ‘It’s another thing that makes me special’… ‘I am against piling on, which is why I was a total f-cking fool whenever anybody asked me that question, including you.'”
Knowles joked that he had to shield his eyes from both the original and the follow-up because they are too painful to watch, but he believes the struggle illustrates a larger issue with Harris. “I guess the question, if you’re this kind of politician, that you would have to ask yourself is: At the end of your career… what was it for,'” he asked. “If you don’t believe anything, if you don’t have any clear conception of the good, if you have no view of anything that you want to do, if you don’t even know what America is, why are you a politician? Is it money or fame? There are easier ways to make money and get fame. Like, why is this woman? Why does she exist?”
It is a question Harris is going to have to answer as she gears up for what many expect to be another run for the White House in 2028 – though Megyn isn’t sure that is going to go well either.
“She thinks this is a soft launch for 2028 when she will have longer than three months to run,” she said. “And you know what else she is going to have? Democrat knives pointed for her because they didn’t have a choice last time around… She was chosen, and they got stuck with her.”
You can check out Megyn’s full interview with Knowles by tuning in to episode 1,121 on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you like to listen. And don’t forget that you can catch The Megyn Kelly Show live on SiriusXM’s Triumph (channel 111) weekdays from 12pm to 2pm ET.