CNN Analysts Tear Into Kamala Harris Over Fracking Flip-Flop—Is She Losing Pennsylvania?
CNN isn’t buying Vice President Kamala Harris’s confusing and contradictory stance on fracking, and it’s causing major waves. In her first big interview since launching her campaign, Harris claimed she wouldn’t ban fracking if elected—a hot-button issue in Pennsylvania, a state she desperately needs to win. But CNN’s Daniel Dale wasn’t convinced and quickly brought up her 2019 presidential campaign, where she clearly supported a federal ban on the practice.
Sitting down with host Abby Phillip, Dale played the tape from Harris’s recent interview with Dana Bash. In it, Harris insisted her position on fracking hadn’t changed, even saying, “I would not ban fracking. As Vice President, I did not ban fracking. As president, I will not ban fracking.” But Dale wasn’t having it. He pointed out that during the 2020 debate against Mike Pence, Harris didn’t clarify her personal stance—she only said that Biden wouldn’t ban fracking, carefully sidestepping her own views.
Dale laid it out: “The fact check bottom line, Abby, is that she did not make clear at a 2020 debate that she had changed her previous support for fracking.” He then played clips from the 2019 CNN climate town hall, where Harris openly committed to a national fracking ban. Dale further explained that in the 2020 debate, Harris was speaking for Biden, not herself, and never directly addressed her own position.
CNN analyst Bryan Lanza wasn’t any more convinced. He pointed out that Harris’s evasiveness on the fracking issue could be a sign of deeper problems. “She clearly doesn’t want to answer the fracking question,” Lanza said. “Because her San Francisco values are out of the mainstream in Pennsylvania. Fracking has been a long part of her issues when she was attorney general, when she was district attorney. That’s who she is.”
Harris’s shaky position on fracking is particularly troubling as she clings to a narrow lead in Pennsylvania. FiveThirtyEight shows her leading former President Donald Trump by just 46.7% to 45%, but local politicians are skeptical. Earlier this month, Senator John Fetterman (D-PA) even predicted that Democrats might lose the state, pointing to fracking as a major issue dividing voters from the national Democratic Party’s climate agenda.
BREAKING REPORT: @CNN had 41 MINUTES of Kamala Harris’ and Tim Walz’s joint interview and only released 18 minutes.
One of the edited segments is reportedly about the Green New Deal and fracking.
Only one way for us to know: RELEASE the unedited video and the FULL TRANSCRIPT! pic.twitter.com/WdB37ELsCE
— Kyle Becker (@kylenabecker) August 30, 2024
With Pennsylvania hanging in the balance, Harris’s mixed messages on fracking could be the tipping point. As the race heats up, it’s clear that the vice president has some serious explaining to do if she hopes to win over voters in this crucial battleground state.
