Vice President Harris on Friday announced that she would create a bipartisan council of advisers if elected president, in an effort to reach out to Republican and independent voters while in Arizona.
“Not only will I have a Republican in my Cabinet, but I’m also going to — I was talking to my team about it — I want to create some structure around the following. Which is, I love good ideas, wherever they come from, I love good ideas,” Harris said.
She added, “part of what I intend to do … is creating a bipartisan council of advisers who can then give feedback on policy as we go forward.”
During her campaign remarks in Scottsdale, in front of a banner of “Country Over Party,” she added that she doesn’t want “yes people” around her.
“We need a healthy two-party system, we have to have a healthy two-party system, we have to,” she said. “It’s in the best interest of all of us.”
She previously has said she would appoint a Republican to a future Cabinet, which she repeated on “The View” this week as an example of something she would do differently than President Biden.
Harris told a story on Friday about sparring with the late John McCain, the former senator from Arizona, in a Senate committee room and later that day, on the floor, McCain told her, “Kid, come over here, you’re going to make a great senator.”
She also told the story about McCain being the final vote to prevent the repeal of the Affordable Care Act during the Trump administration, which she told during a rally in Chandler, Ariz., on Thursday night.
“John McCain stood on principle. He stood on a belief in the importance of patriotism, of sacrifice, of what we stand for as a country,” she said.
In another direct appeal to Republican and independent Arizonans, Harris said, “I am committed to all of you, to be a president for all Americans… knowing we have so much more in common than what separates us.”
Harris’s campaign has worked to appeal to Republican and independent voters in the critical swing states, including Arizona, and have received several endorsements from Republicans, including former vice president Dick Cheney and former Rep. Liz Cheney (Wyo.).
