Kam’s first choice wasn’t Walz…
According to a New York Post report, Kamala Harris chose Tim Walz as her 2024 running mate because she believed Americans were too racist, antisemitic, and homophobic to accept Pete Buttigieg.
In an excerpt from her forthcoming book 107 Days, the former vice president wrote that Buttigieg was her “first choice” but ultimately “too big of a risk” for the ticket.
Buttigieg “would have been an ideal partner — if I were a straight white man,” Harris wrote.
“But we were already asking a lot of America: to accept a woman, a Black woman, a Black woman married to a Jewish man,” she continued. “Part of me wanted to say, Screw it, let’s just do it. But knowing what was at stake, it was too big of a risk.
“And I think Pete also knew that — to our mutual sadness.”
Harris settled on Walz, the Minnesota governor, and the pair went on to lose the popular vote, the Electoral College, and every swing state to President Donald Trump.
In the book, Harris said Buttigieg topped her shortlist of eight possible running mates because “he is a sincere public servant with the rare talent of being able to frame liberal arguments in a way that makes it possible for conservatives to hear them.”
“I love Pete,” she wrote. “I love working with Pete. He and his husband, Chasten, are friends.”
Buttigieg, the former South Bend, Ind., mayor who ran in the 2020 Democratic primaries, is considered an early favorite for the party’s 2028 nomination.
An Emerson College poll released in June showed Buttigieg leading Harris 16% to 13% in a hypothetical Democratic primary, followed by California Gov. Gavin Newsom (12%), Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro (7%) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (7%).
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