Time magazine owner Marc Benioff called out Vice President Kamala Harris on Sunday for repeatedly denying the magazine’s interview requests. Benioff compared Harris with President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, who both interviewed with the magazine in the spring.
The magazine published a story written by Charlotte Alter on how Harris would be as president last week, and Alter wrote that Harris declined requests for an interview.
“Despite multiple requests, Time has not been granted an interview with Kamala Harris, unlike every other Presidential candidate,” Benioff wrote on X. “We believe in transparency and publish each interview in full. Why isn’t the Vice President engaging with the public on the same level?”
Despite multiple requests, TIME has not been granted an interview with Kamala Harris—unlike every other Presidential candidate. We believe in transparency and publish each interview in full. Why isn’t the Vice President engaging with the public on the same level? #TrustMatters…
— Marc Benioff (@Benioff) October 13, 2024
Benioff also added links to the full transcripts of Biden’s and Trump’s interviews the magazine performed earlier this year. At the time of the interview, Biden was seeking reelection before dropping out of the race in July.
Unable to speak with the presidential nominee herself, Alter spoke with “20 current and former Harris campaign advisers, former aides in her vice presidential and Senate offices, senior officials from each of the past five presidential administrations, and a range of policy experts.” Later in the story, Alter added, “Harris declined repeated requests for an interview for this story. In contrast, Trump talked about his policy vision with a TIME reporter for 90 minutes across two interviews. Biden spoke to TIME at similar length before dropping out of the race.”
Altar also wrote a cover story, “The Reintroduction of Kamala Harris,” in August without ever scoring an interview with the vice president, once again quoting Harris supporters such as Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA), and Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ).
The news of the Time interview rejections comes days after Harris called out Trump for refusing to go through with his 60 Minutes interview. Much like Time’s tradition of interviewing candidates, CBS News interviews presidential candidates on the show every October. While Trump went through with his Time interview, he rejected 60 Minutes. Now, the same can be said of Harris and Time magazine.
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Harris has been embarking on a media blitz the past two weeks, doing a podcast interview with Call Her Daddy host Alex Cooper, the 60 Minutes interview with Bill Whitaker, and sitting down with Howard Stern, doing The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, and talking with the co-hosts of The View in a single day.
In her story about Harris, Alter noted how her interviews are rarely with national media: “In part by speaking infrequently to reporters, when she does do interviews, she mostly favors local media, culture podcasts, or friendly talk shows.”