Former President Donald Trump will seek the advice of former Democratic presidential candidate and Hawaii Representative Tulsi Gabbard for his debate preparation against Vice President Kamala Harris, according to the Trump campaign.
Trump has “proven to be one of the best debaters in political history as evidenced by his knockout blow to Joe Biden,” Trump spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said in a statement to the Daily Beast on Friday. “He does not need traditional debate prep but will continue to meet with respected policy advisers and effective communicators like Tulsi Gabbard, who successfully dominated Kamala Harris on the debate stage in 2020.”
Gabbard and Harris sparred in the 2020 Democratic presidential primary on a July debate stage over Harris’ record as a prosecutor, which some have suggested ended her campaign.
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“Senator Harris says she’s proud of her record as a prosecutor and that she’ll be a ‘prosecutor president,’” Gabbard said in her opening remarks against Harris. “But I am deeply concerned about this record. There are too many examples to cite, but she put over 1,500 people in jail for marijuana violations and then laughed about it when she was asked if she ever smoked marijuana; she blocked evidence that would have freed an innocent man from death row until the courts forced her to do so; she kept people in prison beyond their sentences to use them as cheap labor for the state of California; and she fought to keep the cash-bail system in place—that impacts poor people in the worst kind of way.”
In a post-debate interview with CNN, Harris told Anderson Cooper, “this is going to sound immodest, but obviously I’m a top-tier candidate and so I did expect that I’d be on the stage and take some hits tonight.”
“When people are at 0 or 1 percent or whatever she might be at, so I did expect to take some hits tonight,” she added.
Donors were reportedly peeved with Harris’ performance, which she acknowledged, according to The New York Times. Harris dropped out of the race five months later, in December.
Trump campaign insiders have already signaled that the Trump campaign intends to hit Harris over her role as prosecutor, emulating the George H.W. Bush campaign’s “Willie Horton” ad.
The Daily Beast reached out to the Trump campaign for comment but has not received any at the time of publishing.
