Washington DC - A combative pledged a clean break from 's presidency Wednesday in with right-wing Fox News as she sought to reach Republican voters wary of .
Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at a campaign event at Washington Crossing Historic Park on Wednesday in Washington Crossing, Pennsylvania. © Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images/AFP Anna Moneymaker / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA / Getty Images via AFPHarris clashed with interviewer Bret Baier on hot-button issues including , with the Democratic nominee repeatedly asking to be allowed to complete her answers.
"May I finish responding?" Vice President Harris at one point said to Baier, regarded as a tough but fair interviewer, in an encounter broadcast from the battleground state of Pennsylvania.
Pressed on previous comments when she said she could not think of anything she would have done differently from Biden, Harris replied, "My presidency will not be a continuation of Joe Biden's presidency."
"I will bring my life experiences, my professional experiences, and fresh and new ideas. I represent a new generation of leadership," added 59-year-old Harris, who became her party's nominee after the aging Biden dropped out in July.
Biden had said on Tuesday that Harris would "cut her own path" as president.
Harris also launched into a blistering attack on Republican former president Trump (78) for threatening to use the military against internal enemies.
"He's the one who tends to demean and belittle and diminish the American people. He's the one who talks about an enemy within."
Donald Trump has suggested that he would turn our military on the American people.pic.twitter.com/2nX5Vk2hcl
— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) October 16, 2024
I am the only person running for president who has prosecuted transnational criminals. I have spent a significant part of my career going after people who present a threat to the safety of the American people.
— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) October 16, 2024
I take this work quite seriously. pic.twitter.com/NUkOeSZ6pJ
Trump campaign calls Kamala Harris' Fox interview a "train wreck" Former President Donald Trump attends a town hall event on Tuesday in Cumming, Georgia. © Megan Varner / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA / Getty Images via AFPDonald Trump is unstable, and we should all be concerned. pic.twitter.com/dEbEhGbAD5
— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) October 16, 2024
The Democrat faced probing questioning during the interview, during which Fox News played an advertisement for Trump about operations for transgender prisoners, and a clip of Trump defending his military remarks.
Her first-ever sitdown with Fox was a gamble as she seeks to break the deadlock in a White House race that remains neck-and-neck with less than three weeks to go.
Fox News has played a key role in Trump's political rise, and he earlier blasted the network over the Harris interview, accusing Baier of being "very soft."
Trump's campaign later described it as a "train wreck."
"Kamala was angry, defensive, and once again abdicated any responsibility for the problems Americans are facing," Trump spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said in a statement.
Trump also sat down with Fox News ahead of Harris's appearance, in with an all-female audience, where the conversation turned to in vitro fertilization (IVF), a fertility treatment that Democrats say is threatened by his policies.
Despite being on home turf, it was a challenging topic as women have been turned off by Trump's statements on reproductive rights, and by his campaign more broadly.
He was cheered as he told his audience in the swing state of Georgia that Republicans were the party championing the procedure.
"I want to talk about IVF. I'm the father of IVF, so I want to hear this question," he said.
"Kamala Harris’ interview with Bret Baier was a TRAIN WRECK. Kamala was angry, defensive, and once again abdicated any responsibility for the problems Americans are facing. She couldn’t give a straight answer to a single question because she has no answers. Kamala’s entire… pic.twitter.com/DnxuO2Wtty
— Hollywood Resistance (@ResistItAllTX) October 16, 2024
Kamala Harris and Trump compete for reproductive rights votes Vice President Kamala Harris arrives on stage to speak during an event at the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre on September 20, 2024, in Atlanta, Georgia. © JOE RAEDLE / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA / GETTY IMAGES VIA AFPTrump gets all creepy at Fox News town hall. Calls himself the “father of IVF”, and describes US Senator Katie Britt as “young” and “fantastically attractive”. pic.twitter.com/qQsxJ1TcUF
— Mike Sington (@MikeSington) October 16, 2024
Harris, who has made the defense of a centerpiece of her election platform, called his comments "bizarre."
Reproductive rights have been a major vulnerability for Trump since the Supreme Court, featuring three Trump-picked justices, gutted federal protections for abortion access in 2022.
Many in the anti-abortion movement also want to see IVF curbed.
Trump's town hall in Georgia was filmed on Tuesday, the first day of early voting in the closely watched state, with voters casting a record number of 328,000 ballots.
Donald Trump called himself “the father of IVF.” What is he talking about?
— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) October 16, 2024
His abortion bans have already jeopardized access to it in states across the country—and his own platform could end IVF altogether.
Trump has been charged with in the state, allegedly pushing for Georgia officials to "find" enough votes to overturn Biden's narrow win there in 2020.
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