Harris and Walz’s first dance (to a Republican tune)

Vice President Kamala Harris and Gov. Tim Walz (D-Minn.) sat down for their first interview Thursday afternoon, with CNN’s Dana Bash, aired later that night. What we got was a soft Donald Trump platform. Interesting stuff from a literal San Francisco Democrat.

The campaign sold a dual interview with a friendly network, which signals softballs about how they met and interacted. But the campaign may have waited too long to give the press a bite at the apple, and Dana (that’s Dan-ah — new CNN employees are instructed that she hates “Day-na”) virtually blocked Walz out of the 18-minute interview, directing her questions almost entirely toward the top of the ticket.

The takeaway is that Harris looked all right in a populist skinsuit.

Those questions weren’t underhand pitches, either. She asked about flip-flops and her incumbency, and when she spoke to Walz, she asked about the repeated lies he’s told about his military service and his family’s fertility treatments to advance his political career.

Harris made it through the drizzle (it was no storm) clinging to Donald Trump’s playbook, promising to complete the wall, bring industry back to the United States, and expand the child tax credit, among others. When it was finally Walz’s turn, he went deeper into Republican lore, pulling out Rep. Richard Nixon’s vice presidential playbook and talking about his family dog.

Amazing stuff.

While Bash asked some solid questions, her pushback was soft, and worse yet, CNN only aired portions of the 18-minute interview and played clips interspersed between what could have been Democrat informercials (including a segment on a “viral photo” from the Democratic National Convention no one I know had ever seen).

The takeaway, however, is that Harris looked all right in a populist skinsuit. If you don’t know her, you might buy it. She barely cackled, her weird head nod tic was largely (and studiously) held at bay, and she made it through.

Republicans betting that she would self-destruct either here or on the debate stage in 11 days got word that she will not. She's a real opponent now, no matter the lore behind her rise, and Trump will have to beat her on his own turf.

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