Camila Thorndike, a top Harris-Walz campaign climate adviser, abruptly walked back her recent comments stating that Vice President Kamala Harris would be hostile to future oil and gas drilling as president—effectively reversing her reversal of the candidate's position.
In a statement Monday, Thorndike lamented that she wasn't clear enough when she told Politico last week that Harris is not "promoting expansion" of oil drilling and suggested Harris was not fond of a provision in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act mandating fossil fuel leases. Thorndike serves as Harris's "climate engagement director."
"I didn't explain myself clearly here," Thorndike said Monday. "Contrary to Trump's claims, the VP has not banned fracking, doesn't support banning fracking, and in fact cast the tie-breaking vote on the biggest pro-climate law ever, which, yes, opened new fracking leases. People know that's her position."
So Harris's new position in Oct is she now opposes fracking and no longer supports her position in July when she changed her position to support fracking which was subsequently a change in her prior, prior position of June which was to oppose fracking?
Got it. https://t.co/hHrDu7DZ6o
— US Oil & Gas Association (@US_OGA) October 21, 2024
It remains unclear how Thorndike's new statement clarifies her comments from last week. Thorndike did not respond to a request for comment from the Washington Free Beacon.
Thorndike's flip-flopping underscores the Harris-Walz campaign's broader struggle to message on energy issues. Although Harris regularly pushed far-left climate policies—like a nationwide electric vehicle mandate, the Green New Deal, and a fracking ban—before replacing President Joe Biden as the Democratic presidential nominee, she has since disavowed those past positions and sought to take more moderate stances.
Harris has touted rising levels of domestic oil production and highlighted that the Inflation Reduction Act requires fossil fuel leases during campaign events.
"I cast the tie-breaking vote that actually increased leases for fracking as vice president. So I'm very clear about where I stand," Harris told CNN in August.
"My position is that we have got to invest in diverse sources of energy so we reduce our reliance on foreign oil," Harris added a month later during her debate with former president Donald Trump. "We have had the largest increase in domestic oil production in history because of an approach that recognizes that we cannot over-rely on foreign oil."
Thorndike's comments to Politico were notable because they appeared to contradict Harris's newfound support for fossil fuels.
"Just to be clear, Vice President Harris hasn’t said anything that the administration hasn’t already said," Thorndike told Politico. "She is not promoting expansion. She’s just said that they wouldn’t ban fracking, and the fact that anyone could look up is that the [Inflation Reduction Act] required leases, and that was not something that she promoted."
Her statement on Monday introduces additional confusion about Harris's position. The Harris-Walz campaign did not respond to a request for comment.