Former Vice President Kamala Harris’s decision to portray herself as insufficiently supported by President Joe Biden’s team in excerpts from her forthcoming memoir prompted a sharp response from several former Biden aides.
Axios reported Thursday that aides "reacted with rage" after excerpts of Harris’s book, "107 Days," were published. In the passages, Harris says the White House rarely defended her from negative coverage and that positive statements about her work were difficult to secure.
"They had a huge comms team; they had Karine Jean-Pierre briefing in the pressroom every day. But getting anything positive said about my work or any defense against untrue attacks was almost impossible," Harris wrote in the excerpts, which also chronicle her failed 2024 presidential bid.
Multiple former Biden aides disputed her depiction, telling Axios that Harris was attempting to shift responsibility for her difficulties onto the president and his staff. "Vice President Harris was simply not good at the job," one former White House official said, adding that Harris "had basically zero substantive role in any of the administration's key work streams, and instead would just dive bomb in for stilted photo ops that exposed how out of depth she was."
Other aides objected to Harris’s suggestion that she should have urged Biden to step aside earlier in the 2024 race, calling such characterizations unpersuasive. One former aide pushed back on Harris’s framing of her 2023 border responsibilities, saying the notion that she was being set up to fail as a so-called "border czar" did not square with what staffers observed and arguing that greater focus on the work would have altered public perception.
Not all former Biden officials reacted negatively. Ron Klain, who served as Biden’s chief of staff, told Axios that Harris did a "good job" as vice president. Other former staffers said they were relieved she had spoken candidly after years of internal frustration. "We all know that the Biden folks treated her and her team like s---. We never thought she would actually say anything," one former aide said. "The staffers across a range of ages and positions that I'm talking to are proud of her."
The excerpts also touched on sensitive post-2024 topics: Harris acknowledged in the memoir that Biden "got tired" during the re-election effort and denied any conspiracy to conceal cognitive decline, according to published reports. The debate over her account underscores ongoing tensions within Democratic circles over how the 2024 campaign was managed and how allies have discussed it since.
Some commentators noted that the dispute could provoke escalated responses. Media analyst Mark Halperin was quoted as saying that Biden aides were prepared to "drop dirt" if Harris continued to press criticisms of the former president, a remark that highlights how personal grievances from the 2024 cycle continue to reverberate.
The initial reporting on aides’ reactions came via Axios and was picked up by other outlets. Fox News Digital reported that it reached out to representatives for both Biden and Harris for comment but did not immediately receive responses. The excerpts’ release and the ensuing pushback reflect lingering disputes over roles and communications inside the Biden White House and how former colleagues are choosing to recount them publicly.