White House counselor Kellyanne Conway went after Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) on Wednesday, saying the Democratic vice presidential pick would have to answer for her prosecutorial record.
In an interview with Fox News, Conway pointed to Harris’s record of prosecuting marijuana cases as an area where Harris would take fire from the left over her views on criminal justice. Conway simultaneously asserted that those on the right would hit the senator for being weak on crime.
Harris previously served as California’s attorney general from 2011 to 2017.
“I think as attorney general in California, the position that Kamala Harris has held much longer than she’s been a United States senator, people will dig into that record. It looks like she left nobody happy,” Conway told Fox.
“She is seen by those on the far left, many speaking up last night, as not sufficiently for criminal justice reform. She locked up over 1,500 people or so on marijuana charges, and by others who are for public safety and law and order, she is seen as somebody who is soft on some of those criminals,” the White House official added. “And so, I think she has a very mixed record there that people will dig into.”
Allies of the president have sought to cast Democrats as weak on the issue of “law and order” as protests over the death of George Floyd, a Black man who died in Minneapolis police custody, have continued in cities across the country for months.
Many activists have pressed lawmakers to shift resources away from policing to social welfare programs, while President Trump has sought to link calls to defund or abolish police departments to his Democratic opponent.
Conway’s comments come a day after Joe Biden’s running mate announcement and following months of speculation over who the presumptive Democratic nominee would select to take on Trump and Vice President Pence.
Harris previously ran for president in the 2020 Democratic primary, but dropped out before votes were cast in Iowa and New Hampshire.