Harris Addresses Childless Jab During Call Her Daddy Appearance
Last month, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, Arkansas governor and former Trump White House press secretary, took a personal jab at Vice-President Kamala Harris during an event, saying that though Sanders will speak to large crowds where people cheer when she takes the stage, her kids will be quick to remind her that she’s “not that big of a deal” when she returns home.
“So my kids keep me humble. Unfortunately, Kamala Harris doesn’t have anything keeping her humble,” Sanders said, an apparent reference to Harris not having biological children.
Sanders’s comments drew backlash from Harris’s husband, Douglas Emhoff, and many others. But on Sunday, Harris herself responded during an interview with Alex Cooper on the popular podcast Call Her Daddy. “I don’t think she understands that there are a whole lot of women out here who, one, are not aspiring to be humble. Two, a whole lot of women out here who have a lot of love in their life, family in their life, and children in their life,” Harris said. “And I think it’s very important for women to lift each other up.”
The vice-president said that she has both her family by blood and her “family by love,” referencing her two stepchildren she shares with her husband. “I have two beautiful children, Cole and Ella, who call me Momala. We have a very modern family. My husband’s ex-wife is a friend of mine,” she said.
“They are my children, and I love those kids to death. Family comes in many forms, and I think that, increasingly, all of us understand that this isn’t the 1950s anymore,” she continued. “Families come in all shapes and forms, and they’re family nonetheless.”
On Sunday, after the podcast episode debuted, Sanders responded to Harris’s comments in a statement to Politico. “I would never criticize a woman for not having children, the point I was making and that Kamala Harris confirmed by her own admission is that she doesn’t believe our leaders should be humble, which explains her arrogant claim that she alone can fix our nation’s problems after spending the last four years making them worse,” it read.