California Senator and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris stepped into a difficult situation after she laughed after one of her supporters called President Trump “mentally retarded” during a town hall in New Hampshire on Friday.
“So I don’t buy the argument that impeachment does not make sense,” the man said. “There needs to be accountability. What are you going to do in the next one year to diminish the mentally retarded action of this guy?”
“Well said, well said,” Harris replied to a laughing audience.
CBS News caught up with Harris the following day and confronted her for laughing and agreeing with her supporter instead of calling him out and correcting his language. In response, the senator claimed to have not heard the man use the slur.
“I heard him talk about the other stuff and then that came later,” Harris said rather uncomfortably. “It was not something that I really heard or processed or any way condone, that’s for sure.”
There is no way to really confirm what the senator heard or didn’t hear, but watching the video of her interaction with her supporter would suggest she understood him clearly. Of course, it’d be better for politicians to admit their failures and move on from them instead of trying to gloss over the problem or cover it up. But that’s probably wishful thinking.