I haven’t listened to Kamala Harris’s entire Call Her Daddy interview, but I covered some of the clips from it yesterday. What struck me was that hostess Alex Cooper was obviously hyper-focused on VP Harris’s message to women, and even more specifically, younger women. This is the core audience of the Call Her Daddy pod – women under the age of 30, women who are possibly not all that engaged with politics, but young women who understand that their rights are being stripped away. The interview was a larger conversation not just about abortion rights, but abuse and the culture wars against women and the war against bodily autonomy. I gave Cooper high marks for how she conducted the interview. But most political journalists are really upset about it and they’re trying to make “backlash against Kamala for going on ‘Call Her Daddy’” into a thing. It’s only a thing among political journalists. Speaking of:
On Sunday, a 40-minute interview with Vice President Kamala Harris aired on a platform with an audience of 5 million engaged and loyal listeners. No, it wasn’t “Meet the Press” or “Face the Nation.” And it wasn’t “State of the Union” or “This Week.” It was Alex Cooper’s wildly popular podcast “Call Her Daddy.”
There were immediately takes from the mainstream political press about how the “Call Her Daddy” appearance, along with an upcoming interview later this week on Howard Stern’s radio show, were signs that Harris was shying away from substantive interviews and hiding from more combative reporters eager to press her on uncomfortable topics. And there were some snide suggestions about how going on “Call Her Daddy,” a show focused on relationships and sex, was a frivolous use of the VP’s time.
The backlash to the backlash was just as swift, as veteran Democratic operatives turned to social media and Substack to air their frustrations with reporters who they have long thought needed to swallow their egos and wake up to the reality that an increasingly fragmented media environment — and declining trust in traditional news outlets — has changed politicians’ dependency on them.
“In a town full of narcissists, nobody has a bigger sense of entitlement than D.C. journalists. And it’s particularly rich to snipe at the campaign for not doing enough interviews the very week she’s sitting down with the most revered news program in all of television,” said former Obama White House spokesperson Eric Schultz, referring to Harris’ interview with CBS’ “60 Minutes” airing Monday night. “We don’t live in an age when everyone gets their news from three white guys at 6:30 every night,” he added.
Schultz and other Democratic strategists said that it’s not that there isn’t value in going on some of the big network and cable news shows (since accepting the Democratic nomination, Harris has been on CNN and MSNBC and she’s scheduled to participate in a Univision town hall on Thursday). But network and cable news audiences are shrinking. Most people tuning into Jake Tapper or Katy Tur probably already know who they are voting for.
“Harris has to make strategic decisions about every second of her time these last few weeks. You just can’t capture undecided voters by sticking with the traditional press. So by necessity, you have to spend time in other places,” said another Democratic strategist close to the campaign who was granted anonymity to speak about internal party thinking.
I think the calculus here is absolutely right: only political junkies who religiously watch cable news (and already know who they’re voting for) give a f–k about this “she should do more interviews with the NY Times” issue. People are also acting like VP Harris is brand new to this – she’s watched how the Times and WaPo and CNN have treated President Biden for years. She’s seen first-hand the fragmentation of the media and she has every reason not to trust many of those anchors and journalists. But mostly, I think political journalists are mad that Alex Cooper, a 30-year-old podcaster, was able to do a substantive, informative interview which wasn’t based on “Trump said this or that, what’s your reaction” or “how are your going to convince racists to vote for you.”
Photo courtesy of ‘Call Her Daddy.’ Additional pics courtesy of Cover Images.