VP Harris speaks for 1st time since Biden ended campaign, praising his legacy

Vice President Kamala Harris is being thrust into the most scrutinizing of spotlights, suddenly the leading candidate to succeed President Joe Biden as the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee and her party’s main hope of defeating Donald Trump.

She spoke Monday at a White House celebration with the NCAA championship teams, her first appearance since Biden announced he was leaving the race.

Harris said Biden’s list of accomplishments are “unmatched in modern history.”

In her first public remarks since Biden announced he was leaving the presidential race, Harris made no comment of her own presidential candidacy.

Speaking Monday on the lawn of the White House that Biden missed as he recovers from covid-19, Harris said that Biden, in one term, got more done than many two-term presidents.

“I am firsthand witness that every day, our President Joe Biden fights for the American people,” she said. “And we are deeply, deeply grateful for his service to our nation.”

Here’s the latest:

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear says Harris called him after Biden’s announcement

“The vice president called me personally yesterday and called me within a couple of hours of President Biden’s announcement,” Beshear said. “And that meant a lot to me, to reach out to me personally and ask for my support.”

The Democratic governor said he pledged his support to her.

“The rest of that conversation I said would stay between us,” he said.

Asked if she mentioned the No. 2 spot on the ticket, Beshear said: “I’m not going to get into any of those details, but the call was about asking for my support and I pledged it.”

Harris heading to Delaware to meet with Biden campaign staff

Vice President Kamala Harris is heading to Delaware to meet with staffers of the reelection campaign that President Joe Biden gave up.

Her office says Harris will hold a “campaign engagement” in Wilmington, Delaware, on Monday afternoon. Biden reelection campaign headquarters occupies space in two buildings there.

Biden endorsed Harris shortly after announcing he was leaving the presidential race. The campaign announced raising $49.6 million in the hours after his announcement.

Harris is not yet the formal Democratic presidential nominee, but top party elected officials and donors, as well as labor unions and leading advocacy groups, have endorsed her.

Secret Service director faces storm of criticism at congressional hearing

U.S. Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle faced a storm of bipartisan criticism at a congressional hearing Monday, with many lawmakers asking why she had not yet resigned from her job in the wake of the assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump.

The director, who’s spent nearly three decades combined at the agency, remained defiant that she was the “right person” to lead the agency despite overseeing the “most significant operational failure” in decades.

Even so, both Republicans and Democrats pushed Cheatle on why she wasn’t more forthcoming with details about what went wrong on July 13 or how she would ensure it never happens again.

“Tell us what went wrong!” Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas, yelled at Cheatle. “Tell us and don’t try to play a shell game with us.”

Senior adviser to Obama: ‘Democrats … have a chance’

David Axelrod, senior adviser to President Barack Obama, said Biden’s withdrawal and his endorsement of Harris doesn’t simply erase concerns about Biden but elevates Harris as a motivating, tested national candidate who’s grown while in office.

“Democrats didn’t have a chance on Sunday and now they have a chance,” Axelrod told The Associated Press Monday. “It’s really that simple.”

“I think that it’s a different race now because she has maybe some of his liabilities and she may have some of her own,” Axelrod said. “But no one judges her as too old, or unfit in that way.”

The electoral map stays essentially the same, with Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin being the most pivotal states, he said. And within them, Harris will motivate in particular younger voters, Axelrod said.

But Harris faces the daunting task of launching a campaign and building one at the same time. “Which is hard, but it can be done,” Axelrod said.

Reaction in the Gaza Strip on Biden’s exit

In the central city of Deir al-Balah in the Gaza Strip, Palestinians coping with more than nine months of the devastating Israel-Hamas war say they feel indifferent about Biden’s withdrawal from the presidential election.

“We feel the United States is a partner in the assault on Gaza,” Hassan Shaqalieh told The Associated Press. “The news that matters the most to us is the end of the war.”

Biden in May presented a deal that aims to end the war in Gaza and return the Israeli hostages the Palestinian group Hamas kidnapped in their surprise attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7, but Washington is Israel’s biggest political and military ally.

Hamza Fayyad who was displaced from the southern city of Khan Younis, says there has been no trust in Washington for the Palestinian people’s aspiration to a state and end to Israel’s occupation in the Palestinian territories.

“Someone bad leaves, only for someone worse to come in,” he said.

Reaction from China on Biden’s exit

China’s foreign ministry on Monday said it had no comment on Biden’s exit from the presidential race, citing that “the presidential elections are the U.S.′ own affairs.”

The official Xinhua news agency, however, opined that it “once again exposed the ugly reality of U.S. politics.”

“Biden’s withdrawal once again expose the chaos and the essence of U.S. politics where partisan interests rule supreme and money drives elections,” Xinhua said in an editorial.