Vice President Kamala Harris was so shocked by her 2024 loss to Donald Trump that on Election Night she asked advisors whether she should seek a recount.
The new book “Fight: Inside the Wildest Battle for the White House” details the scene as Harris and an equally stunned Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, her vice-presidential running mate, absorbed their stunning loss to Trump.
“She was completely shocked, and Tim Walz was shocked,” The Hill reporter Amie Parnes said on the podcast, “Somebody’s Gotta Win with Tara Palmeri” released Thursday, per the New York Post.
Parnes, who wrote “Fight” with Jonathan Allen, said that amid the confusion reigning in Harris’ camp, Walz sat in his hotel room “stunned.”
“He has no words. And people are kind of explaining to him, same thing with her. And she’s like, are you sure? Have we done a recount? Should we do a recount?” Parnes said on the podcast.
“They thought that they were going to win. And so, you know, when they come back now and say, ‘Oh no, we didn’t really have a chance.’ No, that’s not what they were thinking. They thought they were going to win,” Parnes said.
She said that Harris campaign staffers felt “gaslit” by leadership about Harris’ chances at victory after being told that “things were looking good” for the veep before the election.
Harris also “bought the hype” that she was doing better than she actually was, according to Parnes.
“Kamala Harris was looking at her crowd size, and they felt like the vibe was strong and people were saying, ‘Oh, we have more boots on the ground. We’re doing better in fundraising,‘” Parnes continued. “And she bought all of that. She bought the hype, and so did a lot of people in the campaign.”
Trump defeated Harris in the popular vote and in the Electoral College, becoming just the second president to be elected to two non-consecutive terms in American history.
Democrat Grover Cleveland was the first, in 1892.
