Kamala Harris ran through her list of the country’s most effective presidents and left off the one she served beside.
The former vice president fielded the question Friday at the National Urban League Conference in Nashville, according to the New York Post, where NUL President Marc Morial pressed her to name the leaders she ranked highest. Harris opened with Franklin Roosevelt.
“Oh Marc, don’t make me do that,” Harris told Morial, according to the New York Post, before recounting the 32nd president’s record. She credited him with building Social Security and defending an active role for government during hard times. “He, he appreciated that government has in my mind three essential functions, which is public health, public safety and public education,” she said. (RELATED: ROOKE: Kamala Harris Kisses The Ring In Clearest Sign She’s Not Done Yet)
Harris added John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson to round out her three, the New York Post reported. She then brought up Barack Obama, drawing a burst of applause from the crowd for the 44th president, and praised his push for the Affordable Care Act.
Kamala Harris snubs Biden when asked to name 'most effective' US presidents at Nashville event https://t.co/6NjSdVatgM pic.twitter.com/4bRkbW77ah
— New York Post (@nypost) August 1, 2026
Absent from any of it was Joe Biden, the man who tapped her as his running mate and later handed her the 2024 nomination. The two have feuded openly since her loss, according to the New York Post. Biden abandoned his own reelection bid 107 days out from Election Day and endorsed Harris on his way out. After she lost the Electoral College and the popular vote to President Donald Trump, she faulted the former president’s White House in her book “107 Days,” writing that its communications team left her to absorb blame over the border.
The same appearance doubled as an early look at a possible 2028 platform. Harris backed reforms she avoided during her 2024 run, telling attendees the country should scrap the Electoral College, grow the Supreme Court to 13 seats, and grant statehood to Puerto Rico and Washington, according to Fox News. “I have not made a decision,” she said of another White House bid, Fox News reported. “I am fully, sincerely, focused on these midterms.”
Democratic strategists still peg Harris as the party’s leading 2028 contender. She tops Gavin Newsom by 11 points and Pete Buttigieg by 17 in the RealClearPolitics average, the Washington Examiner reported, while courting the progressive wing through recent outreach to New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani.
