On Friday’s broadcast of CNN’s “Situation Room,” North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper (D) responded to criticism of the lack of policy specifics in 2024 Democratic presidential candidate Vice President Kamala Harris’ DNC speech by stating that “Many people were tuning in for the first time to hear Kamala Harris in depth. And I think it was important for her to give a broad idea of who she was.” And that while she has “a lot of specifics with her economic plan to help control the cost of living”, the “broad strokes” in her speech on the economy and foreign policy “were important.”
Host Wolf Blitzer asked, “In a CNN focus group, on the other hand, of undecided voters, Governor, a common critique of Kamala Harris’ speech was that it lacked policy specifics. Was it a mistake for her to not more clearly lay out her various positions?”
Cooper answered, “Well, you didn’t want to speak for two hours and give a lecture. You wanted to show the country where you wanted to take them, what her policies would affect, middle-class Americans, making sure that they were the ones that got the tax breaks, and not the millionaires. She’s rolled out a lot of specifics with her economic plan to help control the cost of living. It was also important for her to talk about how she was going to be a president on the international stage, contrasting herself, someone who is — she is going to stand by her allies, people will be able to count on the United States of America, our allies will, unlike Donald Trump, who cozies up to dictators. Those broad strokes were important.”
Cooper continued, “Many people were tuning in for the first time to hear Kamala Harris in depth. And I think it was important for her to give a broad idea of who she was. It was important for her to talk about her personal upbringing, her middle-class upbringing, what she did. I told the story of serving as attorney general with her and how she went toe-to-toe with the banks and was able to help us get to the largest consumer finance settlement in the history of our country. That’s the kind of determination that she has, the kind of smarts that she has. And I thought the speech was perfect.”
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