Vice President Kamala Harris’ former communications director floated an alarming idea to elevate her to the presidency before Donald Trump is sworn into office.
Jamal Simmons boldly suggested President Joe Biden should resign in the next few months and let his number two take over following her stunning defeat at the hands of Trump.
‘Joe Biden’s been a phenomenal president, he’s lived up to so many of the promises he’s made,’ Simmons, who ran comms for Harris from January 2022 to January 2023, told CNN’s State of the Union host Dana Bash.
‘There’s one promise left that he could fulfill. Being a transitional figure.’
He rashly continued: ‘He could resign the presidency in the next 30 days, make Kamala Harris the president of the United States. It would absolve her from having to oversee the January 6 transition – of her own defeat.’
Simmons’ wild suggestion sparked a shocked reaction from the other panelists, with conservative Scott Jennings seemingly holding back laughter at times.
‘Jamal’s out here writing the next season of “House of Cards,”‘ Jennings joked.
Simmons previously shared a similar sentiment in a post on X, professing that if Biden were to step down, it would ‘make it easier for next woman to run.’
‘This is something that’s in Joe Biden’s control,’ Simmons continued on the CNN panel. ‘And if he did it, it would fulfill his last promise, it would give Kamala Harris the chance to be the 47th president of the United States of America.’
Simmons also joked that it would ‘disrupt all of Trump’s paraphernalia’ since his team has already made plenty of merchandise with the number 47 prominently displayed.
Biden, 81, chose Harris, 60, to be his running mate in August 2020, even though she attacked him in the second Democratic primary debate over his past opposition to busing black kids to white-dominated schools to achieve desegregation.
When Biden defeated Trump four years ago, she became the first black female and Asian American vice president in US history.
And when Biden announced he wouldn’t seek re-election on July 21 following massive public and private pressure from Democrats, Harris was quickly elevated as the Democratic nominee for president.
Ultimately, Harris couldn’t capitalize on the early momentum she enjoyed from her sudden thrusting into the spotlight, losing to Trump – including in all seven swing states.
Now that the votes have come in, 2016 nominee Hillary Clinton and Harris both lost to him by nearly identical Electoral College margins.
Harris delivered her concession speech at Washington D.C.’s Howard University, her alma mater, where she told her supporters she wouldn’t ‘concede the fight that fueled this campaign.’
She also conceded to President-elect Trump over a phone call on Wednesday, saying she called for a peaceful transfer of power and encouraged him to be a president for all Americans.
With the final electoral college results now in, Trump has won 312 electoral votes to Harris’ 226.
Trump also garnered nearly 3.75 million more votes than Harris as of Sunday, which means he’ll likely be the first Republican presidential candidate to win the popular vote since George W. Bush bested John Kerry in 2004.