Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro accused former vice president Kamala Harris of telling “blatant lies” about him in her new book.
The Democratic governor spoke to The Atlantic's Tim Alberta about the vetting process he underwent as Harris considered who to choose as her running mate during the 2024 presidential campaign, and the Washington Post reported that the typically composed Shapiro appeared to lose his cool over some claims in her post-campaign memoir "107 Days."
"Harris wrote that, while interviewing Shapiro during the running mate selection process, he had 'mused that he would want to be in the room for every decision,' prompting Harris to tell him bluntly that 'a vice president is not a co-president,'" the Post wrote. "Harris wrote that she worried Shapiro 'would be unable to settle for a role as number two and that it would wear on our partnership.' She told him that on every day she was president, she’d have 'ninety-nine problems and my VP can’t be one.'"
Alberta wrote that Shapiro sounded exasperated by suggestions that he had tanked his interview for the job.
“I did ask a bunch of questions," he said, according to Alberta. "Wouldn’t you ask questions if someone was talking to you about forming a partnership and working together?”
Harris also wrote that Shapiro had asked her residence manager how many bedrooms were in the Naval Observatory, where vice presidents live, and mused about asking the Smithsonian to loan him some Pennsylvania art for the residence, and Alberta said that detail seemed to provoke the governor.
“That’s complete and utter bulls---,” Shapiro told Alberta. “I can tell you that her accounts are just blatant lies.”
Alberta said Shapiro "snapped" when asked whether he felt betrayed by Harris, whom he's known for 20 years.
“I mean, she’s trying to sell books and cover her a--,” Shapiro told The Atlantic. “I shouldn’t say ‘cover her a--.’ I think that’s not appropriate … She’s trying to sell books – period.”