US Vice President Kamala Harris has hit back after she was criticised for spending more than $500 on cookware during a trip to Paris.
US Vice President Kamala Harris brushed off negative media coverage about her, saying she will not be distracted by “ridiculous” headlines.
Ms Harris has been criticised for spending more than $500 on cookware while on a trip to Paris last month and was described as a “bully” in reports that claim her behaviour is behind the exodus of high-level staffers from her office, the New York Post reports.
Other reports have highlighted the rivalry between her and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg over who will be the likely Democratic presidential nominee in 2024 or 2028.
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She called those headlines “ridiculous” and said it’s part of being a high-profile target in the Biden administration.
“There is nothing about this job that is supposed to be easy,” Ms Harris told the San Francisco Chronicle in an interview published on Sunday.
“If something is coming to me, it’s because it needs to be addressed and because, by definition, it’s not going to be easy. If it was easy, it would have been handled before it comes to me,” Ms Harris said.
She bristled at the coverage about the cookware.
“Oh, how about, ‘She’s going to buy a pot on her way to the airport,’ after a very significant and highly successful bilateral meeting in France on issues that are about national security, on issues that are about climate, on issues that are about what we are doing in terms of international norms and rules on everything from cyber to space. Come on,” she said.
The Vice President, who previously served as a US senator from California, said she’s hoping to travel around the country more next year.
“I love people, and there’s so much that we are doing that is directly impacting and with the people in mind,” she said.
She pointed out that after “two years of Covid … the level of, I think, undiagnosed trauma that people have experienced, the level of anxiety, it’s real”.
“And I have always felt that my responsibility as an elected leader is to go to the people, especially when their needs must be addressed and they must know that they are being seen and being heard,” she added.
This article originally appeared in the New York Post and was reproduced with permission
Originally published as Kamala Harris says ‘ridiculous’ headlines won’t distract her
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