Welcome to POLITICO’s West Wing Playbook, your guide to the people and power centers in the Biden administration. With Allie Bice. Send tips | Subscribe here | Email Alex | Email Tina “Her portfolio is trash.” That’s what BAKARI SELLERS, one of the most public and vocal defenders of Vice President KAMALA HARRIS, thinks of the slate of policy issues she’s been assigned to address. Speaking as part of a panel for Politics & Prose earlier this week moderated by theGrio’s APRIL RYAN, Sellers knocked President JOE BIDEN for not utilizing Harris properly, and for giving her “a portfolio that's not meant for [her] to succeed.” That portfolio is full of issues that, given the political realities, are difficult to tackle — the two biggest being shoring up federal voting rights (which she asked for) and curtailing the number of immigrants coming to the southern border from Northern Triangle countries by fixing the root causes of migration. The fact that one of Harris’ most public allies was saying, essentially, that Biden saddled her with it raises the obvious question: Was he sanctioned to do so? In an interview, Sellers was very clear his comments weren’t a form of backdoor complaining from the VP’s office, and emphasized that he hadn’t talked to her office before he made them. “My only point was if you're going to task her with voting rights, then the president needs to be passionate in his push to narrow the filibuster,” Sellers said. “The work she's doing on it is amazing. No doubt. But the ultimate success comes from the president actually taking on the very real issue of the filibuster.” West Wing Playbook asked around to see if Sellers’ comments were causing any friction internally. They’re not … for now. “The Vice President appreciates the faith the President has in her and her ability to tackle tough assignments,” Harris’ Deputy Press Secretary Sabrina Singh told POLITICO. Still, as far as D.C. parlance goes, it’s rare for a surrogate to take such complaints public. Indeed, we had trouble thinking of a past time when such a prominent ally of a sitting Vice President openly complained about the work the president had handed him. But Sellers does love to speak his mind. He is one of the most recognizable Democratic pundits on TV. In 2006, he became the youngest African American elected official in the country as a member of the South Carolina legislature. During the 2020 Democratic presidential primary, his much sought after endorsement went to Harris. He was later chosen as a co-chair for the Harris campaign and continues to be one of her most vocal defenders. Sellers says his frustration lies in what he sees as a larger under-utilization of Harris as the administration looks to sell its “Build Back Better” agenda — trillions of dollars worth of spending on infrastructure and domestic programs packaged in two pieces of legislation currently being debated in Congress. A White House official pushed back on Sellers’ characterization of Harris’ portfolio as quixotic. “The most pressing issues confronting our country are what make it to the vice president and the president. The easy things don't make it there,” they said. “Vice President Harris is taking on pressing issues no different than the vice presidents before her.” And aides note that the vice president has been on the road multiple times promoting aspects of the two bills. On Friday, Harris was in New Jersey pitching the child care provisions that are expected to be included in the Democrat-only bill the party is looking to pass via budget reconciliation. “Our nation is strongest when everyone is able to participate. This is fundamentally what the issue is about when it comes to working parents,” Harris said during a roundtable. On voting rights, Harris has spent months conducting meetings with key stakeholders and amplifying the work of groups like the Texas Democrats who came to D.C. to delay a vote on a restrictive state law. But with almost zero appetite from Senate Republicans to support federal voting rights legislation, it’s not going anywhere unless the chamber’s 50 Democrats decide to overhaul filibuster rules. And that’s not happening, at least anytime soon. After Sellers’ “trash” comment went public, he received some blowback from Harris fans on Twitter who were concerned he wasn’t helping her cause. But he says he’s not going to stop. “People want to punish me for being critical or being opinionated but I don't care,” Sellers said. “One of the things the vice president has done is be a team player. I know those questions were always looming when she was nominated [as Biden’s vice president] but she’s been nothing but a team player. My advocacy is that it goes both ways,” Sellers said PROGRAMMING NOTE: West Wing Playbook will not publish on Monday Oct. 11. We’ll be back on our normal schedule on Tuesday Oct. 12. We hope absence makes the heart grow fonder. Do you work in the Biden administration? Are you in touch with the White House? Are you JEANNIE RANGEL, associate director of the social secretary? We want to hear from you — and we’ll keep you anonymous: westwingtips@politico.com. Or if you want to stay really anonymous send us a tip through SecureDrop, Signal, Telegram, or Whatsapp here. | 
