Podcaster Joe Rogan says Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris offered to sit with him for an hour-long interview, but he refused to travel to her and wanted the chat to take place at his Texas-based studio over the usual three hours.
While almost every other interviewer on the planet would have jumped at the chance to sit down with Harris for a full hour, the world‘s most successful podcaster decided he would not compromise.
“They offered a date for Tuesday, but I would have had to travel to her and they only wanted to do an hour,” Rogan complained in a late Monday tweet. “I strongly feel the best way to do it is in the studio in Austin. My sincere wish is to just have a nice conversation and get to know her as a human being.
With the election just a week away, he did not rule out a further compromise that suits both sides: “I really hope we can make it happen.”
Rogan, who the election season has turned into some kind of latter-day David Frost, interviewed Harris’ Republican rival, former president Donald Trump, on Friday. Their three hour tête-à-tête was released the next day and has since accrued over 37 million views on YouTube alone.
Among other things, Trump’s “weaving”—as the former president likes to describe his oft-incoherent rambling—during the interview included a suspicious brag that, despite admittedly eating truckloads of fast food, he wowed doctors at the Walter Reed Army hospital with his purported ability to run endlessly on a treadmill.
Episodes of The Joe Rogan Experience typically run multiple hours long, which would explain Rogan’s issue with being offered a one-hour sitdown.
The show also leans into the intimate setting, where the host sits across a table from his guest and invites them to participate in a freewheeling conversation.
On the other hand, a packed campaign schedule mere days from the election means it’s not unreasonable that Harris can’t offer up a giant block of time to a podcaster without disrupting existing plans.
Trump, for example, left a Michigan crowd waiting for three hours in the cold, with as many as half of those who showed up leaving according to attendees, because of how long his Rogan interview went on.
The host of the world’s most listened to podcast, Rogan boasts a massive audience that overwhelmingly consists of men and skews young, a demographic the Trump campaign has worked to solidify as the former president’s history of sexist outbursts and the Republican ticket’s position on abortion has sunk their prospects with women voters.
The Harris campaign, meanwhile, has made a concerted effort in recent weeks to claw into Trump’s reservoir of support among men with a blitz of campaign advertising during sporting events and strategic media appearances such as a sitdown with former NFL star Shannon Sharpe on his popular Club Shay Shay podcast.
Harris is set to appear on the popular morning radio show The Breakfast Club, co-hosted by Charlamagne tha God, DJ Envy, and Loren LoRosa, on Tuesday.
Trump tried to mock the idea that Harris could handle an appearance on Rogan‘s show when he sat for an interview with the host. “It would be a mess,” Trump said. “She’d be on the floor. Comatose.”
Rogan shot back and defended Harris: “I think we’d have a fine conversation. I’d just try to have a conversation with her and hopefully get to know her as a human being.
