Local, national interviews show Kamala Harris has taken questions from media

Conservative commentator Dinesh D’Souza took aim at Sen. Kamala Harris in an Instagram post for allegedly dodging the press since former Vice President Joe Biden, the Democratic nominee for president, tagged her as his running mate in mid August.

"Kamala Harris was picked to be Joe Biden’s VP 42 days ago," said the Sept. 23 post. "There are 41 days until the election. She has not formally taken questions from the press a single time."

The post was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.)

The claim appears to have originated with NBC News reporter Deepa Shivaram, who tweeted a day earlier that "the senator has not once formally taken questions from the press." 

The tweet racked up thousands of likes and retweets and was shared by a number of news reporters. Eric Trump and other allies of President Donald Trump also picked it up. And it made the jump to Instagram when D’Souza shared it to his more than 900,000 followers.

But Harris hasn’t shunned the media, as D’Souza’s Instagram post suggests. The California senator sat down for her first interview as a vice presidential candidate with the 19th News on Aug. 14, three days after Biden announced her as his running mate.

Since then, Harris has done interviews with national organizations such as People, ABC News, NBC, Univision, BET and CNN. She also interviewed with the Grio, a site targeting African American readers, and she appeared on Showtime’s late-night talk show, "Desus and Mero."

On Sept. 21, two days before D’Souza’s post, Harris spoke with Urban Radio Networks reporter and CNN political analyst April Ryan and joined radio host Russ Parr for his show. She is slated to appear Sept. 28 on MSNBC’s "The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell."

Harris has also interviewed with a number of local news outlets. The outlets PolitiFact identified include: three TV stations and two radio stations serving south Florida; a TV station in Charlotte, N.C.; two TV stations in Milwaukee; a TV station in the San Francisco Bay Area; two TV stations in Phoenix; a TV station in Las Vegas; two TV stations in Philadelphia; a TV station in Detroit; and a TV station serving the Flint and Tri-Cities region of Michigan.

When a reporter asked Biden why they hadn’t "seen her out very much" during a Sept. 4 press conference, Biden said Harris has been busy campaigning on his behalf.

"She’s been on the road," Biden said. "She’s out herself. The role is that, just like when Barack and I campaigned, we try to cover as much territory as we could, and both of us out campaigning."

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“MSNBC actually said on air ‘I hope enough people die from coronavirus that it harms Trump’s re-election.’”

Shivaram, the NBC News reporter, clarified her original point in a second tweet, which was posted in response to a question and received significantly fewer shares. She said Harris has, in fact, done interviews with both national networks and local outlets in states she’s visited. 

What Harris hasn’t had, Shivaram wrote, is an informal briefing where reporters covering her campaign stops can ask questions, aside from a "few shouted questions."

"Just to be clear, she's taken questions," Shivaram tweeted in response to another reporter’s retweet. "But it's us shouting them out as we're moving in and out of rooms, or as she's walking in and out of events. Nothing more established than that."

D’Souza did not respond to a request for comment.

An Instagram post says Harris "has not formally taken questions from the press a single time" since Biden named her as his vice presidential pick. That’s inaccurate. Harris has made numerous media appearances and interviews since the Aug. 11 announcement.

We rate this Instagram post False.