Van Jones commends Harris for letting her ‘guard down’ with Oprah

CNN commentator Van Jones applauded Vice President Harris for letting her “guard down” during the Democratic presidential nominee’s event with media mogul Oprah Winfrey. 

Jones praised the White House candidate when reacting to Harris’s remarks on Thursday when she stated, “If somebody breaks into my house, they’re getting shot. I probably should not have said that. My staff will deal with that later.” 

Jones, a Democratic strategist and former Obama administration official, said Harris’s quote during her discussion with Winfrey exemplifies who she is as a person. 

“That’s also Kamala Harris, [I’v known] Kamala for 25 years, and listen, I would, I would advise you not to break into Kamala Harris’s house,” Jones jokingly said during his Friday night appearance on CNN’s The Source with guest host Boris Sanchez. 

“Don’t do it,” he continued. “And I think it’s great. I love the fact that she’s out there talking. And even though it’s unconventional, it’s Oprah Winfrey is not, you know, [CNN’s] Jake Tapper. Listen, that was a really fascinating interview, and she let her guard down. That’s Kamala Harris. She grew up in Oakland. Don’t run up to her house. Do not run up in her house.” 

Jones said Harris and her campaign are doing a “great” job in using “unconventional” media to reach voters. He referenced the vice president’s recent 10-minute interview with technology magazine WIRED, arguing it was a way to reach a section of undecided voters who normally do not consume cable news. 

“So she did that very unconventional interview with WIRED but it was really fascinating because what they did was they just took all the normal internet searches that regular people are doing, and they had her answer the questions off the internet and it was really fascinating,” Jones said. 

Since rising to the top of the ticket, Harris has received criticism for her lack of media appearances and on-the-record interactions with reporters. In the WIRED interview, the Democratic nominee got candid about her role as a stepmother to her two adult children, Cole and Ella Emhoff, and Jones argued this type of detail is attractive to voters.

“And what she said about her family, I thought, was beautiful, because, frankly, a lot of us have been impacted by divorce, either as children or as adults. Kamala Harris is A++ in figuring out how to make a blended family work,” he continued. “Many of us wish we had families that work as well as hers, and I think we, I think we should be lifting up Kamala Harris’s example.”

The CNN pundit said Harris still has room to grow when it comes to introducing herself to voters who are not familiar with her. Jones argued that some of those voters are not looking for more policy details from her, but “they want to know her.”

“Now get off that stage,” he continued, calling for Harris to interact with voters. “The Beyonce thing is fine, but get here, get knee to knee with reporters, be with regular people, talk to people you know on their phones where they can see you. And I think she’s going to do better and better as we go.”