What would Kamala Harris do?
By: Blake Jones and Dustin Gardner (POLITICO)
Bullet dodged. World safe.
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
SCHRÖDINGER’S STRIKE — The world will never know if a President Kamala Harris would have bombed Iranian nuclear facilities as Donald Trump did — but that’s not stopping rampant speculation about what might have been.
Jamie Metzl, a former Clinton administration official who supported the strikes, said he voted for Harris but argued she “would not have had the courage or fortitude to take such an essential step as the president took.” Republicans also cast her as weak on foreign policy, while some anti-war Democrats on social media scolded progressives who withheld their votes for Harris in protest of the U.S.’s Israel policy — assuming Harris wouldn’t have authorized the attack.
A spokesperson for Harris declined to comment.
Harris the hawk … There’s no telling whether Harris would have acted differently if the U.S. found itself in the same position — with Iranian facilities having amassed uranium enriched up to 60 percent, according to the U.N. nuclear watchdog — five months into her presidency. She has long expressed hawkish views on Iran, and didn’t rule out U.S. military involvement in the country during her 2024 campaign.
“Make no mistake, as president, I will never hesitate to take whatever action is necessary to defend American forces and interests from Iran and Iran-backed terrorists, and I will never allow Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon,” Harris told Jewish voters on a preelection call last fall. “Diplomacy is my preferred path to that end, but all options are on the table.”
The former vice president said last fall on “60 Minutes” that she considered Iran to be the United States’ greatest adversary.
“Iran has American blood on their hands,” she said. “And what we saw in terms of just this attack on Israel, 200 ballistic missiles, what we need to do to ensure that Iran never achieves the ability to be a nuclear power. That is one of my highest priorities.”
But but but … Harris stopped short of pledging to take military action against the country if there was evidence it was building a nuclear weapon. She has consistently urged diplomacy, including during her first presidential run, when she expressed support for reentering the Iran Nuclear Deal.
She also criticized Trump for his administration’s assasination of Iranian military officer Qasem Soleimani in early 2020, saying the action “put more American lives at risk and could lead to a new war in the Middle East.”
Question mark … Harris hasn’t commented on the recent strike as she weighs running for California governor or president, again.
And while social media influencers are asserting they know what would have been, foreign policy analysts are busier watching Iran’s next steps than engaging in Harris-related hypotheticals.
“We can’t obviously predict what one would have done,” Mara Karlin, who was assistant secretary of defense for strategy, plans and capabilities in the Biden administration, told Playbook. “I would have liked to think that she would have been incredibly thoughtful and deliberate before choosing to use force, done everything possible to secure American service members and only send them in harm’s way if it was absolutely necessary.”
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"It is time for us to do what we have been doing. And that time is every day." -- Kamala Harris
"The world will never know if a President Kamala Harris would have bombed Iranian nuclear facilities"
She gets very confused when she sees the word "bombed". She just walks around looking for the vodka bottle.
For a minute there, I thought you were referring to Nancy Pelosi.........same church, different pew
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Her past actions show she wouldn't do a damn thing.
Iran Czar? Tell the Iranians "Do Not Build" and then look away.