By Nicholas Nehamas and Zolan Kanno-Youngs
Vice President Kamala Harris agreed on Tuesday with the radio host Charlamagne Tha God that former President Donald J. Trump was a fascist, going a step further than she had before in casting her Republican rival as a dangerous authoritarian leader.
During a free-flowing interview that often spoke to the concerns of Black Americans, Ms. Harris was contrasting her vision for the nation with Mr. Trump’s when Charlamagne jumped in to say: “The other is about fascism. Why can’t we just say it?”
“Yes, we can say that,” Ms. Harris replied.
Her comments came days after it was revealed that Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under Mr. Trump, had called the former president “a fascist to the core,” according to a new book from the journalist Bob Woodward.
Ms. Harris’s hourlong appearance on Tuesday in Detroit with Charlamagne — a co-host of the popular hip-hop morning radio show “The Breakfast Club,” which has many Black listeners — was part of a major push to counteract weakening support from Black voters. And during the conversation, she predicted that the election would come down to the wire.
“This is a margin-of-error race,” she said. “I’m going to win, but it’s tight.”
Here are five takeaways from the interview.
Harris sharpened her attack on Trump as ‘weak’ yet dangerous.
For much of her vice presidency, some of Ms. Harris’s aides have thought she is too cautious in her public remarks. But when it came to Mr. Trump on Tuesday, she did not hold back.
She agreed with Charlamagne that Mr. Trump has embraced fascism and said that his plans would make “it more difficult for working people to get by and to destroy our democracy.” Republicans have accused Democrats of fomenting political violence, including the assassination attempts on Mr. Trump, by labeling him a threat to democracy. Mr. Trump, for his part, has repeatedly described Ms. Harris as a fascist.
On Tuesday, the vice president’s comment was just one in a series of blunt attacks on his character and what he represents.
She also attacked him for admiring dictators, citing a report that he sent President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia valuable Covid-19-testing equipment “when Black people were dying every day” from the pandemic.
“The man is really quite weak,” Ms. Harris said. “He’s weak. It’s a sign of weakness that you want to please dictators and seek their flattery and favor.”
She again condemned Mr. Trump for his role in the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021, even as she shut down questions about whether the Justice Department had moved too slowly to prosecute him and whether he should be in jail in November.
“The court should handle that, and I’m going to handle November,” she said.
She sounded nothing like Obama.
Ms. Harris adopted a far different strategy to appeal to Black voters, specifically Black men, than former President Barack Obama used when he campaigned for her last week in Pittsburgh.
Responding to the wavering enthusiasm among some Black men that has caused panic in the Democratic Party, Mr. Obama scolded them and accused them of not “feeling the idea of having a woman as president.”
On Tuesday, Charlamagne said Mr. Obama had been “finger-waving at Black men” and questioned when anti-Harris white voters would be admonished.
“What is happening is that we are all working on reminding people of what is at stake,” Ms. Harris replied. But she also acknowledged that she was not owed anyone’s support.
“I need to earn every vote, which is why I’m here having this candid conversation with you and your listeners,” she said.
This article was originally published in NY Times