CNN political commentator Ashley Allison suggested Sunday that Vice President Kamala Harris' historically low approval rating is largely driven by the fact that she is a "Black woman" and a "history maker."
During a roundtable discussion on CNN's "State of the Union," ex-Trump aide and "The View" co-host Alyssa Farah Griffin made the case that Harris could be a political liability with swing voters and that putting her front and center on the campaign might be a mistake for the Biden-Harris ticket considering her abysmal approval rating.
The conversation was centered around attempts by Republican primary candidates to make Harris the focus of their attacks, highlighting Biden's age and the possibility of a "President Harris" if he is reelected.
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CNN commentator Alice Stewart said Harris is taking heat from GOP candidates because she is choosing to attack Republicans instead of "talking about her own failures."
"Yes, the president is old, and Kamala Harris is the heir apparent, potentially if he were to step aside. But look where this began the vice president was given a very impressive portfolio to deal with the border crisis and election reform. She failed on both counts. She has not done her job… she's not a popular vice president. So instead of her talking about her failures, she's attacking Republicans, and they're simply responding…she has appointed herself the attack dog, and she's getting hit back," Stewart said.
Allison, who worked on the Biden-Harris campaign as a senior staffer, immediately jumped to Harris' defense, arguing that race and gender play are to blame for Harris' striking unpopularity and lack of accomplishments in office.
"I think this is happening for a couple of reasons. Most people don't know what vice presidents do. And now she is a history maker. She is a woman, she is a Black woman, and it's the easy thing to do to say she's the attack dog, go after her," Allison said.
"She was not put in charge of the border. She was put in charge of the root causes and going down to Central and South America to discuss what is happening. And everyone admits our immigration policies are in crisis," she continued. "It's not because of Kamala Harris. It's because we have not been able to find bipartisan reform."
"We all know the election systems are broke. We have a former president who won't even acknowledge that he lost the election. That's not because of Kamala Harris," Allison added.
A Fox News poll released in June showed Harris having a 41% approval rating and a 56% disapproval among voters. An NBC poll released in the same month found only 32% of registered voters have a positive view of Harris, compared to 49% with a negative view, including 39% with a "very negative view." This leaves Harris with a net -17 rating, which NBC News noted is "the lowest for any vice president in the poll’s history."
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ABC News' Linsey Davis brought up the poll in an interview with Harris earlier this month, asking the vice president, "How much of a role, if any, that you feel that race and gender play in that?"
Harris replied, "Well, there are polls that also say I have great approval ratings."
Harris has been in the news in recent weeks for her attacks on Florida's Black history education curriculum, making a special trip to Jacksonville, Fla., to say it replaces "history with lies" and that students in the Sunshine State would be "told that enslaved people benefited from slavery."
Allison said Harris is hoping to win back support from voters and regain momentum by "taking it outside of Washington DC.
"She's done with us, the pundits, and she's going to the people who actually elect her. She's talking about the issues that women care about…abortion - and I appreciate it and I think we will see her numbers start to increase and people will be accepting of her on the job," she said.
Fox News' Joseph A. Wulfsohn contributed to this report.
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