Kamala Harris is "not competent" to be president, US President Donald Trump has said as he launched an attack on the Indian-origin senator's credentials for the top post.
Addressing his supporters at a Republican campaign rally in New Hampshire on Friday, Trump said he would support seeing a female president in the US but suggested that his daughter and senior White House adviser Ivanka Trump would be a better candidate for such a role.
Harris, 55, was a presidential aspirant until last year before she dropped out of the race because of lack of popular support. Harris returned to political limelight after Joe Biden, the Democratic Party's presidential candidate, picked her as his running mate in the November 3 election.
Born to a Jamaican father and an Indian mother, Harris is the first Indian-American and first Black woman to be picked by a major American political party for the top post.
"You know I want to see the first woman president also, but I don't want to see a woman president get into that position the way she'd do it, and she's not competent," Trump said.
"She's not competent," he said amidst applause from his supporters, a few of whom screamed Ivanka Trump, at an election rally on Friday.
"They're all saying, 'we want Ivanka'. I don't blame you," he said responding to his supporters.
This was Trump's first election rally after he formally accepted the nomination of the Republican Party on Thursday for the presidential election.
Trump said Harris withdrew from the Democratic Party's presidential race before primary season kicked off as her popularity dropped down to single digit.
"How about her? Sheer beauty? What a beauty though. They pick a woman who starts off...She (Harris) starts off (her presidential campaign) sort of strong. She's one of the favourites. Within a period of a few months, she goes down, down 15, 12, 11, nine, eight, five, three, two," he said, underlining the popularity downslide of Harris in the few months after her highly impressive campaign launch.
"Then she goes, I'm going to leave because I've decided that I want to leave. I want to leave. She left (the race of presidency) because she wouldn't have gotten any votes. She was terrible. And this would be your president possibly. I don't think so. I don't think so," Trump said, speculating on the possibility that Harris could emerge as a Democratic presidential candidate in 2024.
Meanwhile, At least four people at the recently concluded Republican National Convention (RNC) in North Carolina have tested positive for the novel coronavirus, according to authorities. In a statement on Friday, the Mecklenburg County Public Health authorities said that the four people were two prospective attendees and two support staff, reports Xinhua news agency.
GOP convention used video without permission
Three of the four residents of New York City public housing whose criticisms of Mayor Bill de Blasio were used in a video at the Republican National Convention said they were never told their comments were to be showcased in that manner.
The New York Times reported Friday that Claudia Perez, Carmen Quinones and Manny Martinez didn't know that their comments from an interview with Lynne Patton were going to be used in support of President Donald Trump.
Quinones, a Democrat, told the Times that Patton - a Trump administration appointee with the Department of Housing and Urban Development - had called her and asked her to bring together some people to speak about the city's housing authority and their concerns, but that she was never told it would be part of the convention.
In the almost 2 1/2-minute video, four tenants are interspersed with clips of Trump and de Blasio. The tenants are heard criticizing the New York City mayor and praising the Trump administration's efforts.
Perez told the Times she meant what she said about the New York City Housing Authority, but was angry about being tricked into appearing in a convention video.
"I am not a Trump supporter," she said. "I am not a supporter of his racist policies on immigration. I am a first-generation Honduran. It was my people he was sending back." The fourth person in the video was not mentioned in the Times' story.
