DNC doubles as audition for possible Harris administration

CHICAGO — It may be measuring the drapes, but speculation over the makeup of a possible Harris administration has already begun as Democrats nominate Vice President Kamala Harris at their Chicago convention.

Although Democrats with presidential aspirations of their own deflected, other party officials appeared open to being appointed to senior posts if Harris defeats former President Donald Trump in November.

Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE), a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and close ally of President Joe Biden, was seen as a top contender to replace Antony Blinken as secretary of state, and still could in a Harris term.

“Look, whether it’s on the Foreign Relations Committee or in another role, I very much look forward to continuing to contribute to shaping American foreign policy,” Coons told the Washington Examiner outside delegate breakfasts at a downtown Chicago hotel. “I’m confident that Kamala Harris would be a great president for American national security and foreign policy, having heard some of her most consequential foreign policy addresses and having had the chance to both serve with her in the Senate, and talk with her about her vision for the future.”

Biden’s secretary of commerce, Gina Raimondo, said “whatever [Harris] needs” when asked whether she would be open to joining the next administration, particularly as treasury secretary.

“But right now, we got to get her to win,” she added.

Raimondo, who is attending the convention in a personal capacity in order to comply with the Hatch Act, which prohibits certain political activity by civil servants, defended Harris’s economic message as “an absolutely winning” one.

“Her message is build up the middle class, create good-paying jobs for everyday Americans, and bring down costs,” the former Rhode Island governor and chairwoman of the Democratic Governors Association told the Washington Examiner at a Michigan delegation breakfast. “That’s what’s on the mind of most Americans.”

Tom Vilsack, another politician at the convention in a personal capacity, laughed when the Washington Examiner suggested he might serve as agriculture secretary for a third consecutive Democratic administration.

“You know, my focus has been for almost my entire adult life, to work hard, to create economic opportunity for people who live and work in rural towns, in small towns — as a small town lawyer, as a mayor, a state senator, governor of a state, and a secretary in two administrations,” he told reporters at a Wisconsin delegation breakfast. “That’s my focus today. It’s always gonna be my focus, regardless of the capacity of where I might find myself.”

Vilsack, the current agriculture secretary, also served in the same post under former President Barack Obama.

Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D-NM), who was considered for the position of health and human services secretary under Biden, similarly seemed to leave the door cracked open.

“I want to do my part to keep moving America forward and, whatever that is, count me in,” Lujan Grisham told the Washington Examiner at a Georgia delegation breakfast.

Gov. Tony Evers (D-WI), Wisconsin’s former superintendent of public instruction, was less direct when pressed on the prospect of becoming education secretary.

“I’m not even going to try talking about that,” Evers told the Washington Examiner at a Badger State delegation breakfast.

He was not alone in dismissing speculation about a role under Harris. A number of Democrats with presidential aspirations, as well as those who were considered to be Harris’s running mate, said they had no plans to leave their current posts.

Gov. Andy Beshear (D-KY), a possible 2028 presidential candidate who was interviewed by Harris for the vice presidential nomination before she tapped fellow Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN), said he was content as governor.

“I’m right where I’m supposed to be,” Walz told reporters after a Democratic National Committee Rural Council meeting. “I love being governor of Kentucky. I’ve got 3 1/2 years left to do my best. … So, I’m going to serve out every single day doing my best for every part of Kentucky as governor.”

Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ), another vice presidential contender, similarly deflected about the prospect of joining a Harris administration.

“Tell you what I am interested in right now, I am interested in having every opportunity to get out there in Arizona and across this country to talk to the American people about why Kamala Harris needs to be our next president,” Kelly told reporters after a DNC Veterans and Military Families Council meeting. “I’m not focused on any of that. I’m focused on the next 77 days.”

New York Attorney General Letitia James, who prosecuted Trump for civil fraud, added at a breakfast for her state that she loves being “the attorney general of the great state of New York” and was not seeking to graduate to the federal counterpart.

Another possible 2028 presidential hopeful, Gov. Wes Moore (D-MD), should remain as Maryland’s governor, at least according to Sharonda Huffman, an Old Line State delegate.

“He wants to stay governor. He didn’t want to be considered for vice president,” Huffman told the Washington Examiner at a breakfast. “He still has work to do … and then, whatever happens next, he’s young.”

For Rotimi Adeoye, a young Pennsylvania delegate, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg should be secretary of state, with rumors that he could be the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

“I think he has the experience for it,” Adeoye told the Washington Examiner after Buttigieg addressed a Keystone State breakfast. “I think he’d be a great addition to showing the youthful energy of the Cabinet, but also giving someone like him that has had such impressive experience, just more experience in the Cabinet. Yeah, I think he’d be great.”

To that end, Sam Hens-Greco, chairman of the Allegheny County Pennsylvania Democrats, dismissed the idea of Beshear or Govs. Josh Shapiro (D-PA) and Gretchen Whitmer (D-MI) leaving their jobs because of their own ambitions.

“I think it’d be really hard for us to pull away like Whitman or Beshear or Shapiro,” Hens-Greco told the Washington Examiner. “I don’t see them leaving.”