Vice President Kamala Harris is irritated, but not by the state of the country and the admin’s failures, but by a Vogue cover photo that she had an aide complain to editor Anna Wintour, a new book claims.
Wintour defended the chosen photo of Harris in Converse sneakers and skinny pants as “relatable” in a conversation with incoming Harris press secretary Symone Sanders, according to excerpts of the upcoming book “This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden, and the Battle for America’s Future.”
“Harris was wounded. She felt belittled by the magazine, asking aides: Would Vogue depict another world leader this way?” the book states, according to the excerpts, which were obtained by Politico.
Harris apparently favors a photo of her in a more formal powder blue suit, which ended up as a limited edition alternative to the sneakers-and-skinny-pants pic, which leaked ahead of the release of the February 2021 issue.
The complaint about the pic reportedly surprised incoming President Joe Biden’s team, according to the book, written by New York Times reporters Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns.
Tina Flournoy, who would become Harris’ chief of state, reached out to the Biden campaign about the perceived slight and was caught “off-guard by the anger in Harris’ circle,” Politico reported.
The Biden adviser allegedly told Flournoy that “this was not the time to be going to war with Vogue over a comparatively trivial aesthetic issue,” the book said, according to Politico.
“Tina, the adviser said, these are first-world problems,” the excerpt stated.
The book excerpts also show early tension between Biden’s and Harris’ offices in the early days of the administration, including early disagreements about the vice president’s role in the administration’s foreign policy, Politico said.
Harris’ team had wanted her to oversee relationships with Nordic countries, which were considered “low-risk diplomatic assignments,” the book stated.
“White House aides rejected the idea and privately mocked it,” the excerpt said, according to Politico. “More irritating to Biden aides was when they learned the vice president wanted to plan a major speech to outline her view of foreign policy. Biden aides vetoed the idea.”
Later, the excerpt said, Harris was “resigned” to the assignment of taking the lead with Central American countries Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador amid soaring migration across the US border with Mexico. Harris wanted to avoid the label “border czar” and blamed Biden for categorizing her assignment as being related to immigration.
Harris’ office and the White House didn’t comment to Politico. Wintour didn’t respond to a request to comment.
