Speaking to Oprah Winfrey on Thursday, Vice President Kamala Harris suddenly championed the right to bear arms and defend oneself in one’s home, saying she would shoot someone who would break into her home.
Winfrey mentioned Harris acknowledging she was a gun owner in her debate with former President Donald Trump. “I did not know that,” Winfrey said. “And I thought that was powerful.”
“If somebody breaks into my house, they’re getting shot, sorry,” Harris answered.
Kamala Harris: “I’m a gun owner…If someone breaks in my house, they’re getting shot, sorry. I probably should not have said that. Hahaha! My staff will deal with that later. Hahaha!” pic.twitter.com/wF6KufDqfY
— Conservative War Machine (@WarMachineRR) September 20, 2024
Yet in 2020, Harris said Stand Your Ground laws were racist, saying, “These Stand Your Ground laws and these states that have these citizens’ arrest laws have often, often and frequently been used as an excuse if not a cover for people who are motivated by racism and racial profiling. And so we have seen that. And we have seen that it has been used as an excuse to kill black and brown people, and particularly black and brown young men.”
During Monday’s #DemandingWomen conversation, Sen. @KamalaHarris shared her thoughts on how Stand Your Ground laws are making American communities less safe, particularly for young Black and brown men. pic.twitter.com/xXugeiLEiF
— Everytown (@Everytown) May 20, 2020
Additionally, as San Francisco’s district attorney in May 2007, Harris threatened:
It’s people who own guns who are quietly sitting on those guns. And those guns might end up being the weapons of the destruction of a community cause they get in the hands of some kid who decide that they like what they see on television and they want to act that way. So this is about just basically saying that we’re gonna require responsible behaviors among everybody in the community and just because you legally possess a gun in the sanctity of your locked home doesn’t mean that we’re not gonna walk into that home and check to see if you’re being responsible and safe in the way that you conduct your affairs.
“The remarks came during a press conference introducing legislation that Harris helped draft, which sought to impose penalties for gun owners who fail to store their firearms properly at home,” Fox News noted.
During the presidential debate, Harris declared, “This business about taking everyone’s guns away. Tim Walz and I are both gun owners. We’re not taking anybody’s guns away. So stop with the continuous lying about this stuff.”
Harris previously advocated on multiple occasions during her failed 2020 presidential campaign for a “mandatory” gun buyback program of assault weapons. Examples can be found here, here, and here.
The remarks from Harris sparked a variety of reactions online.
“Kamala Harris advocated for door-to-door mandatory gun buyback programs,” said journalist Stephen L. Miller. “Maybe a journalist worth the professional reputation would follow up on that one.”
The Trump campaign responded to Harris’ remarks: “Can Kamala describe the make and model of the gun she allegedly owns? And explain why she spent years advocating for door-to-door, mandatory gun confiscation? This is called pandering — and nobody is buying the bulls***.”
Attorney and political commentator Laura Powell mocked Harris by highlighting her past support for law enforcement to enter people’s homes to inspect the way their firearms are stored.
“Hey, Kamala, I’m sure you understand that we’re going to have to come into the sanctity of your locked home to check to see if you’re being responsible,” she wrote.
