The Trump administration has called former Vice President Kamala Harris “sick” for calling Donald Trump a “tyrant” with a “fragile ego.” In an interview Monday night, she attacked Trump and his attacks on the government, his MAGA movement, his attempts to restrict free speech, and his use of merger regulations as political leverage.
The defeated 2024 presidential contender was promoting her new book, 107 Days, on MSNBC’s The Rachel Maddow Show on Monday, her first major TV interview since she left office this year. Harris criticized the “titans of industry” in the business and corporate sector for not “speaking up” against Trump and instead giving in to his demands during a heated 40-minute discussion.
Having worked in the private sector and being “a lifelong public servant,” she stated that she has always believed that “if push came to shove, those titans of industry would be guardrails for our democracy and the importance of sustaining democratic institutions.”
Harris referred to them as “feckless” for caving in to Trump’s “outrageous demands,” saying, “They have been silent.” “It’s not like they’re gonna lose their yacht or their house in the Hamptons,” she added, before stating, “Right now we are dealing with, as I called him at my speech on the Ellipse, a tyrant.”
Harris pointed out that last week, ABC gave in to conservative pressure and removed late-night host Jimmy Kimmel from the air for remarks he made about Charlie Kirk. She also mentioned several billion-dollar business mergers that Trump’s administration has needed to approve by the Federal Communications Commission.
🚨MAJOR BREAKING: Kamala Harris DEMOLISHES Trump on Maddow calling him “a tyrant who’s using the federal government to execute his whim and fancy because of a fragile ego” and urging “Titans of industry” to stand up to him.
THIS IS WHAT LEADERSHIP LOOKS LIKE. pic.twitter.com/AXbWxtmI0f
— CALL TO ACTIVISM (@CalltoActivism) September 23, 2025
“We used to compare the strength of our democracy to communist dictators,” she noted. “That’s what we’re dealing with right now in Donald Trump. And these titans of industry are not speaking up.”
“Perhaps it is because his threats and the way he has used the weight of the federal government to take out vengeance on his critics is something that they fear,” Harris remarked. “And I get that. We’ve seen the demonstration of it. Perhaps it is because they want to please him and nominate him for a Nobel prize.”
“But at some point, they’ve got to stand up for the sake of the people who rely on all of these institutions to have integrity and to, at some point, be the guardrails against a tyrant who is using the federal government to execute his whim and fancy because of a fragile ego,” Harris continued.
🔥”DONALD TRUMP IS A TYRANT”
“PROJECT 2025 WAS DECADES IN THE WORKS”
” DEMOCRATS PLAY BY THE RULES..BUT WE HAVE TO FIGHT FIRE WITH FIRE” – KAMALA
KAMALA HARRIS INTERVIEWS WITH RACHEL MADDOW TO SELL HER BOOK THAT SHE TOTALLY WROTE HERSELF.
We are SO LUCKY Obama didn’t get… pic.twitter.com/6gFA24YRw9— Johnny St.Pete (@JohnMcCloy) September 23, 2025
“Failed presidential candidate Kamala Harris is inciting violence on MSDNC, calling the duly elected President of the United States—who escaped two assassination attempts—a ‘tyrant.'” The White House’s Rapid Response 47 X account dubbed Harris “SICK,” sharing a video of the MSNBC interview.
James Blair, the Deputy Chief of Staff at the White House, also posted a portion of Harris’ interview on X with the caption, “I cannot overstate the pleasure it brings everyday to walk into the office this woman will never occupy.”
Harris stated in her interview that the MAGA agenda is larger than Donald Trump and has been “decades in the making.”
