PHILADELPHIA — Vice President Kamala Harris struck a measured tone Tuesday, even steering clear of mentioning former President Donald Trump by name in an interview with Black journalists that starkly contrasted with the Republican presidential nominee's own highly contentious appearance before the same group.
The two candidates briefly put their differences aside in a phone call Trump described as "very, very nice" following a second apparent assassination attempt against the former president on Sunday.
"I checked on him to see if he was OK, and I told him what I have said publicly: There's no place for political violence in our country," Harris said. "I am in this election and this race for many reasons, including to fight for our democracy, and in a democracy, there is no place for political violence. We can and should have healthy debates and discussion and disagreements, but not resort to violence to resolve those issues."
Harris' session with the National Association of Black Journalists was one of the few extensive sit-down interviews she has done since replacing President Joe Biden atop the Democratic ticket in July. She repeatedly criticized Trump on issues including his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and opposition to abortion access, but was careful to refer to him as the former president and in other ways that avoided naming him directly.
However, she did not hold back when addressing the situation in Springfield, Ohio, and the threats against Haitian migrants there. In recent weeks, both Trump and his running mate — Ohio U.S. Sen. JD Vance — have helped spread false claims that Haitians in the city have been stealing and eating residents' pets.
"It's a crying shame, literally, what's happening to those families, those children in that community," the vice president said. "We've got to say that you cannot be entrusted with standing behind the seal of the President of the United States of America, engaging in that hateful rhetoric that, as usual, is designed to divide us as a country."
On Monday, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine announced members of the Ohio State Highway Patrol would be dispatched to Springfield to help protect schools and other facilities, many of which have been the subject of bomb threats. Even in the face of statements from both DeWine and city leaders that the rumors about migrants eating pets are unsubstantiated, Trump and Vance have refused to back down.
"If I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that's what I'm going to do," Vance said Sunday in an interview with CNN, quickly clarifying that he "created the focus that allowed the media to talk about this story and the suffering caused by policies."
Harris, for her part, did not seemed moved.
"Look, you say you care about law enforcement — law enforcement resources (are) being put into this because of these serious threats that are being issued against a community that is living a productive, good life before this happened," she told the NABJ, further accusing Trump and Vance of "spewing lies that are grounded in tropes that are age old."
Harris answered questions from three association journalists at a small, relatively quiet venue at the Philadelphia studios of public radio station WHYY. That was very different from Trump's addressing the NABJ conference in Chicago in July, when he was antagonistic to the moderators and sparked an uproar by questioning the vice president's racial identity.
Her manner was a departure from her campaign rallies, where Harris often receives some of her loudest applause by declaring that her professional background as a prosecutor means, "I know Donald Trump's type."
Pressed about reports of eroding support among Black male voters, Harris said she wasn't "assuming I'm gonna have it because I'm Black." She ducked a question about whether she'd support efforts by some congressional Democrats for reparations from the government to compensate descendants of slaves for years of unpaid labor by their ancestors. Biden has backed the idea of at least studying reparations.
So far, Biden and Harris have tried to avoid politics in their responses to Sunday's incident, instead condemning political violence of all kinds. The president also urged Congress to increase funding to the Secret Service.
Asked if she herself felt safe from threats, Harris said she did, but then steered the focus back to Springfield and the challenges its residents are facing, migrant or nor.
"Not everybody has secret service (protection), and there are far too many people in our country right now who are not feeling safe," she said. "I have secret service protection, but that doesn't change my perspective on the importance of, of fighting for the safety of everybody in our country."