First lady Jill Biden on Thursday didn’t deny a report that she uttered a profanity about Vice President Kamala D. Harris for accusing Joe Biden of racism during a Democratic presidential primary debate in June 2019.
“My goodness, that was two years ago, we’ve moved on from that,” Mrs. Biden told reporters at a vaccination event at a hospital in Washington.
An upcoming book about the 2020 presidential race describes Mrs. Biden’s fury at Ms. Harris over her challenging Mr. Biden for opposing school busing in the 1970s, a policy from which Ms. Harris said she benefited as a little girl.
After the debate, Mrs. Biden vented about Ms. Harris to supporters on a phone call, according to journalist and book author Edward-Isaac Dovere.
“With what he cares about, what he fights for, what he’s committed to, you get up there and call him a racist without basis?” Mrs. Biden said, according to multiple people on the call. “Go f—- yourself.”
The first lady wouldn’t comment further to a reporter who asked her about the episode Thursday.
“We are here to do vaccinations,” she said at the event with Dr. Anthony Fauci at Children’s National Hospital.
During the debate, Ms. Harris unleashed her attack on front-runner Mr. Biden by saying that his past position on busing could have affected her life.
“There was a little girl in California who was part of the second class to integrate her public schools and she was bused to school every day. That little girl was me,” Ms. Harris said, adding that Mr. Biden’s views personally offended her.
Ms. Harris dropped out of the race before the end of the year, and Mr. Biden eventually tapped her as his running mate. She became America’s first Black and first female vice president.
Ms. Harris has tried to laugh off the episode when it’s been brought up, saying “it was a debate.”
• Dave Boyer can be reached at dboyer@washingtontimes.com.
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