Kamala Harris walked into fellow Democrat Richard Pan's Sacramento campaign stop on Friday, addressed a room full of staffers, and delivered what she considered a comedic masterstroke: "Please remember to shower!"
Nobody laughed.
The former vice president cackled at her own line while the entire room sat in dead silence. Not a courtesy chuckle. Not a polite smile. The staffers just stood there, dazed and confused as to why Harris told them they needed to be reminded to shower, waiting for a punch line that never came from the former Second Lady. Which, if you've watched Harris work a room before, is a familiar posture for everyone involved.
Harris was in Sacramento stumping for Pan, a former California state senator and doctor now running for California's 6th Congressional District against Republican incumbent Kevin Kiley. The appearance was supposed to boost Pan's profile. Instead, it produced the kind of viral moment campaigns spend months trying to bury.
Watch the awkward joke by Harris for yourself
The shower joke wasn't even the most revealing part of the visit. Pan's campaign actively banned reporters from covering the event. KCRA 3, Sacramento's local NBC affiliate, was shut out. So was The New York Times. Pan's own campaign spokesman confirmed that "the decision to exclude not just KCRA 3 but also The New York Times, was at the direction of Kamala Harris' team."
When Kamala's team was followed up with on why they wouldn't allow certain media outlets to cover the campaign event, her teams response was to point the finger back at Pan's campaign staff. They cited the Democrat's unwillingness to have media outlets that don't automatically tow the Democratic Party's line for them at the campaign event.
When Democrats are vulnerable they nearly always take this route -- keep the media circle small, include only outfits that are known to follow the Democrat Party's narrative. You don't ban The New York Times from covering a campaign event because things are going well. You ban them because you already know what the footage is going to look like, and you'd rather it not exist.
Pan is running in a district where Kiley, a former Republican turned independent, is likely to win. It's a swing district at best for Democrats. The Democrat party wanted a boost. Instead they got a shower joke landing in a silent room and a press ban that became the story.
Harris's team chose who could watch. They just couldn't choose the reaction.