Rancor persists between Biden, Harris camps as term draws to close

With just two weeks left to go before the presidential transition is complete, rumors are rife that some members of the first family feel less than gracious about the manner in which they are departing the White House.

Said to be particularly prickly about the end of the current administration is first lady Jill Biden, whose disdain for Vice President Kamala Harris -- and for other Democrats she feels betrayed her husband -- seems to be deepening by the day, as libertarian commentator Kennedy reports in the Daily Mail.

Frosty climate persists in D.C.

Support for Kennedy's hypothesis comes from a recent piece in the Wall Street Journal on the waning months of Joe Biden's term in office, a time that insiders told the outlet has been “depressing” as well as “draining.”

Jill Biden's apparently simmering dislike of Harris, which dates back to a Democratic Party primary debate in 2019, rose quickly back to the surface in the wake of her husband's ouster from his own re-election campaign this summer.

Seemingly feeling as though she has nothing to lose by displaying her feelings openly, Mrs. Biden very visibly gave Harris and her husband Doug Emhoff the cold shoulder at a Veterans' Day event not long after Donald Trump's victory in the general election.

Mrs. Biden's ire was also evident to observers in December during the Kennedy Center Honors, when neither the president nor the first lady offered any acknowledgment or friendly gesture toward Harris and Emhoff when the entered the venue to the crowd's applause.

Other indicators of the tension between the Bidens and the Harris-Emhoffs were the fact that Jill Biden sported what many viewed as a MAGA red pantsuit on Election Day as well as the friendly reception the president and first lady offered to Trump during a traditional transition-related visit to the White House.

Boiling point imminent?

With aides and insiders speaking to the WSJ about the tension in the air at the White House in the administration's waning days, Kennedy posits that for Harris, Jan. 20 cannot come soon enough.

The humorous commentator added of Harris, “I'd hire a food taster with whatever campaign cash she hasn't burned through. The Bad Doctor [Jill Biden] may be thinking to herself – only one woman leaves Washington alive.”

Indeed, Emily Goodin of the Mail recently suggested separately that the Bidens “have been quietly sharpening the metaphorical carving knives, with their sights set firmly on the one-time allies they perceive as having wronged them,” a list that include not just Harris, but also former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the Obamas.

One D.C. insider reportedly said, “Jill views Democrats on Capitol Hill, the [wider] party, the Obamas, staff inside and outside the White House, the media, and all of Washington, D.C. with such misguided resentment that I can't imagaine she [isn't] encouraging [Joe] to burn the whole thing down, despite his better judgment.”

Whether that might come in the form of a tell-all book or some other kind of scorched earth gesture, however, only time will tell.