Free Republic

When a draft of a blockbuster Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade leaked in 2022, Vice President Kamala Harris met with Ron Klain, then the White House chief of staff, in her West Wing office. He had an idea: She should lead a new task force on abortion rights. She seemed uncertain. “Why?” she asked. “We need a real leader, and you’re the leader,” Mr. Klain responded. Ms. Harris asked for time to think about it. She did not want to just give a speech without substance. And she had spent much of the previous year and a half...

“I’m standing behind a Black woman to be president of the United States, and it doesn’t make me any less of a Black man,” said the Illinois attorney general. “I’m asking all of you all to do the same.” A day after Vice President Kamala Harris announced that she intended to seek the Democratic presidential nomination, more than 40,000 Black men from across the country convened on a virtual fund-raising call to discuss what the moment required of them. For four hours, one Black man after another — prominent politicians, activists, entertainers — laid out the challenges ahead for Ms....

In recent weeks, Vice President Kamala Harris has dashed off to Florida on short notice. She sparred with the state’s conservative governor, Ron DeSantis, over how to teach slavery in schools. And she flew into Iowa to defend abortion rights while 13 Republican presidential candidates were having dinner a few miles away. Although her words were directed at Republicans, her message was also aimed at all her doubters. Once a rising star as a senator in California, Ms. Harris has for years been saddled by criticism of her performance as vice president. She has struggled with difficult assignments on issues...

The dizzying events of the past week have pushed to the sidelines the congressional squabbling over President Biden’s domestic agenda, and are already redefining the arc of his presidency.WASHINGTON — Ron Klain, the White House chief of staff, gave a pep talk early on Feb. 18 at the daily gathering of the president’s most senior aides: The next 10 days, he said, will be the most consequential of the Biden presidency.President Biden’s military and intelligence chiefs had told him that a Russian invasion was all but inevitable. Mr. Klain, a veteran of Washington and one of Mr. Biden’s closest advisers,...

PARIS — Vice President Kamala Harris spent hours talking with Emmanuel Macron, the French president, managing to skirt a recent diplomatic rift between the two allies over an Australian submarine deal. She attended a conference on promoting democratic elections in Libya. And she secured a commitment for the United States to join a nonbinding international declaration to protect civilians against cyberattacks. During a tightly choreographed trip to France this week, Harris appeared determined to assert herself as a diplomatic asset for a president who believes he knows more about the process — and the vice presidency — than most. The...

President Trump moved to replace the top ranks of the Department of Homeland Security on Monday, a day after forcing the resignation of its secretary, Kirstjen Nielsen, as he accelerated a purge of the nation’s immigration and security leadership. The White House announced the departure of Randolph D. Alles, the director of the Secret Service, who had fallen out of favor with the president even before a security breach at his Mar-a-Lago club that the agency effectively blamed on Mr. Trump’s employees. Government officials, who asked not to be identified discussing personnel changes before they were announced, said at least...