We see a lot of spinning in politics. But there’s also something worse: outright gaslighting. This has been happening increasingly in recent months, as we approach Election Day.
A former vice president Kamala’s communications director made a statement during a CNN segment on Tuesday regarding the presidential debate in June between President Biden, the GOP nominee Donald Trump, and the Vice President. It was so outrageous that conservative commentator Scott Jennings slapped his face before calling out his colleague.
Discussion was about Harris’s decision to withdraw from the ABC News debate. The Trump and Harris campaigns disagreed on whether the microphones would always be on.
The Harris campaign claimed they wanted the candidates to be hot during the debate. The Trump campaign argued that the terms of the ABC News debate were the same as those of the CNN debate. That is, the microphone would be turned off while the opponent spoke.
Jamal Simmons, one of Harris’ many communications directors during the three-and-a-half years she served as vice president, said that Trump had “zero to one” when it came to debates:
Right now, Trump is a zero-for-one in debates. Right? He might think he won the debate, but he may have lost it because of this debate. After that debate, Joe Biden left. Joe Biden went, and he ended with Kamala. He should be careful.”
Jennings looked incredulous, then he face-palmed, and finally, he gave Simmons a fact check that was not convenient.
“Zero one for Jamal?” Jamal, brother and colleague: zero for. He ran a politician who had been in the political field for 52 years from his profession because of a debate. I know you are all arguing for the better candidate but Trump won that debate. [Laughter] Trump is not a zero-to-one. “Are you saying that he performed so well that he did poorly?”
Watch:
.@ScottJenningsKY face-palms after @JamalSimmons says Trump “may think that he won that debate, but…he actually lost the war…because after that debate, Joe Biden left and..he ended up with Kamala Harris, so he should be careful.” pic.twitter.com/iT910Xz42i
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) August 27, 2024
.@ScottJenningsKY after @JamalSimmons suggests some sort of 4D chess in Trump beating Biden at the debate, but then losing the election to Kamala: “Zero for one? Jamal, Jamal, my brother and colleague, zero for — he literally ran a man who had been in politics for 52 years out of… pic.twitter.com/0arvdHRy64
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) August 27, 2024
A fact check on Simmons should have included the fact that Joe Biden didn’t just “leave” his race. He was forced to leave by the same people that, just a month earlier, when a video of Biden being gently walked off stage by Barack Obama during a Hollywood fundraising event surfaced, told us to move on, there was nothing to see and he was a competent, capable leader.
The behind-the-scenes machinations that were used to shame Biden out of the race are also disturbingly undemocratic, considering Harris never received a single vote for her in presidential primaries, nor did she win one in either 2020 or 2024, when she dropped out embarrassingly before the primaries. It was almost as if the nomination had been handed to Harris and, some might argue, stolen from Joe Biden.
Scott Jennings deserves a round of applause for educating Simmons on the June debate results. It wasn’t his first time doing this. I thought that this wasn’t even a point of contention, but Democrats have no shame when it comes to revising the past.
