In 2020, after Joe Biden and Kamala Harris won the election, Donald Trump and his administration refused to do anything to help the incoming administration. The Bidens were already familiar with the White House, obviously, but Mike Pence apparently refused to invite Kamala Harris and Doug Emhoff to the Naval Observatory (the VP’s official residence) during the transition. Then January 6th happened and y’all know the rest. I remember reports that the Secret Service kept VP Harris from moving into the Naval Observatory for weeks/months out of safety concerns and because of the state of the place. Crash cut to four years later. Apparently, VP Harris has not invited the Vances to the Naval Observatory, but she did instruct her staff to provide some information to the Vances.
When JD Vance, his wife Usha and their three young children move into the Naval Observatory residence on Jan. 20, it will be their first time inside the white Queen Anne-style mansion that has been home to vice presidents since the 1970s. Vice President Kamala Harris has not extended an invitation for a formal sit-down or tour, multiple Democratic and Republican sources told CBS News.
In November, Usha Vance, via intermediaries, reached out to staff for the home’s current occupants, Harris and Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff, seeking details including what they would need to childproof it. Ewan, Vivek and Mirabel Vance are all under the age of eight. The questions were initially rebuffed by a Harris political appointee. But there has since been communication between the Vance team and Navy aides who oversee the residence.
Before Christmas, Navy officials provided an overview of the house to discuss the layout of the residence, logistics and practicalities of the move-in, and to help answer any questions the Vances had, a person familiar with the call said. Usha Vance spoke with Emhoff for about 40 minutes last week, sources said. Harris sources said that arrangements are underway to accommodate the Vance children. Spokespeople for Vance and Harris declined to comment.
But people close to Harris say she was never afforded an opportunity to visit the home before she was sworn in in 2021. However, she took office during the COVID outbreak, just after the Capitol riot — and Donald Trump had refused to admit he had been defeated in the election. Advisers to then-Vice President Mike Pence dispute that an invitation was never offered. They say he quietly gave Harris and Emhoff a chance to visit in the waning days of the Trump administration. The invitation came discreetly because Trump resisted accommodating the incoming administration. No formal sit-down between Pence and Harris ever took place, Democratic and Republican sources said.
People close to Harris defended her decision not to invite Vance to visit, a tradition that was broken during the Trump-Pence administration. Harris’ team has been focused on an overseas trip that was canceled and on the California wildfires.
I was surprised when President Biden immediately invited Trump for a White House sit-down and photocall right after the election, and even more surprised that Trump actually went. That, to me, was the Biden-Harris administration doing the bare minimum of “what is right” for the incoming administration. It also sounds like VP Harris would have been happy to completely blank the Vances throughout the transition, but she had a change of heart because of the Vance kids. It absolutely sounds like Harris directed her people to help out the Vances with logistics and arrangements for the sake of the three Vance kids. It also sounds like Harris is rightly more concerned with what’s happening in her home state than all of this MAGA drama.
PS… Remember when Vance was stalking VP Harris across the country and literally sniffing around her plane?
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Backgrid, Cover Images.
