Not many successful prosecutors with government experience at both the state and federal levels list their summer jobs in high school and college on their CVs. That’s because, at a certain point in your career, it doesn’t matter anymore – especially when, like Kamala Harris, you can call yourself the country’s first Black female Vice President.
But that didn’t stop conservative news outlet The Washington Free Beacon from trying to put Harris on blast for failing to include the time she says she spent working at McDonald’s alongside her time prosecuting drug traffickers and for-profit colleges attempting to scam students.
In the August 29 story, “I Did Fries’: Kamala Harris Claims She Worked at McDonald’s, but She Never Mentioned It Until She Ran for President. Did She Really Toil Beneath the Golden Arches?”, the Free Beacon points out that the Democratic Presidential nominee didn’t mention her time serving Big Macs and fries on job applications or in her two books. They add that the information didn’t come up until she spoke at a 2019 labor rally in Las Vegas during her 2020 Presidential campaign.
Harris confirmed the news in an April 2024 appearance on “The Drew Barrymore Show,” when she mentioned working at a California McDonald’s restaurant during the summer after her first year in college.
Free Beacon editor Peter J. Hasson shared their reporting in an August 29 post on X.
“Kamala Harris’s missing ‘summer job’ at McDonald’s job. Her resume and job application a year after graduating college – @FreeBeacon obtained through FOIA – don’t mention it. Neither do either of her books or either of the biographies of her,” he captioned the post.
Although Hasson’s post has received over 13 million views, many of the commenters think this attempt to discredit the Democratic Presidential nominee is a reach.
“I started my own snow shoveling business when I was 13 called “Melt 4 You” but I’ve never put that on my CV, and I don’t call myself a former ‘small business owner.’ I guess I’m a fraud too,” wrote columnist and Justice Correspondent for The Nation, Elie Mystal.
Former Illinois Republican Congressman Adam Kinzinger agreed that the “scandal” was much ado about nothing.
“I worked at Hardee’s and you won’t find that in my book, resume, or anywhere. Because i was 16,” he wrote.
Other commenters were quick to point out that while trying to condense their work experience into a resume that’s easy to digest, those who aren’t handed a cushy corporate job right out of college might have to leave some things out.
“Yeah that’s because you have to fit a resume into one page and any of us who didn’t go straight to working for daddy have jobs that don’t make the cut,” wrote someone.
But most people just wanted to know why The Free Beacon was trying to make news out of something so trivial.
“Man I would actually be humiliated to have this level of ‘journalism’ associated with my name. I’d quit before I let them publish this with my byline,” wrote someone.
