Mark Cuban reveals why he turned down Kamala Harris's VP offer in 2024

Independent

4 hours ago

Billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban has revealed that Kamala Harris invited him to submit vetting materials in order to be considered as her running mate last year, but he declined.
In an interview with The Bulwark 's Tim Miller on Thursday, the host asked the former Shark Tank reality TV personality about rumors linking him to the failed Harris campaign.
'There was some green room gossip at MSNBC,' Miller said. 'You ready for this? You ready? I wouldn't tell you this if it wasn't pretty good. Somebody I kind of trust said that they asked you to send in VP vetting papers and you said, 'No, the list would be too long.' Is that true?'
'It is true,' replied Cuban, who once supported Donald Trump but remained a prominent Harris supporter throughout the 2024 campaign while denying harboring any ambition to serve in her cabinet should she win.
'Why didn't you consider, I mean, you ended up there campaigning with her, advising her,' Miller asked.
The Dallas Mavericks owner replied: 'The second part of that, my response was I'm not very good as the number two person. And so if the last thing we need is me telling Kamala, you know, the president that, no, that's a dumb idea. Right. And I'm not real good at the shaking hands and kissing babies.'
Harris ultimately chose Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her vice presidential nominee from a final three that also included Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and Arizona Senator Mark Kelly.
Walz initially enjoyed success with his attack on Trump and JD Vance, labeling them as 'weird,' and offering a friendly, folksy, blue-collar alternative that ultimately proved insufficiently appealing to prevent a Republican win.
Miller told Cuban that he had sold himself short with that negative assessment of his own qualities.
'I don't know about that. I mean, I was talking to Pete Buttigieg a couple of weeks ago and I was like… I want to, you know, give you a time machine. We're going to go back in a DeLorean. Like, what can we do different?' he said.
'So I want to ask you that same question, but also in the context, like if it was you instead of Tim Walz, who the hell knows? I don't know. It feels maybe different. It feels maybe different.'
Cuban responded: 'I mean, obviously it would have been different. My personality is completely different than Tim's. My experiences, my backgrounds are completely different. I think I've cut through the s*** more directly. I'm not a politician. And so it would have been different, but it would have been awful.
'She would have fired me within six days!' he joked.
'It would have been better than the present situation, you know?' Miller insisted.
'Well, yes, that's true. But, you know, I really thought she was going to win,' Cuban answered.
The interviewer concluded: 'Here's why I want to pick on that. And I know you don't want the clip here. You're like, 'We would have won if Mark Cuban was VP.' And I get that. I don't even know if I believe that, but maybe.
'I think it would have been meaningfully different in a way that like picking Josh Shapiro or whatever wouldn't have been meaningfully different in a way that's kind of hard to predict.'