Joe Rogan Says The Kamala Harris Campaign Lied About Him Not Making Time To Have Her On His Podcast: “We Have All The Receipts”

Clearing his name. Since Donald Trump won the 2024 presidential election back in November, there's been a lot of conversation surrounding what went wrong with the Kamala Harris campaign. Despite spending a billion dollars and running what the media breathlessly proclaimed to be the best presidential campaign in history, the vice president lost all seven swing states as Trump gained with pretty much every demographic on his way to a historic second non-consecutive term. There's obviously been a lot of finger-pointing at the campaign from people who are apparently trying to keep themselves from having to admit that Harris was just a terrible candidate. But another one taking a lot of blame for the failed campaign is...Joe Rogan. The podcast host released an episode of his insanely popular Joe Rogan Experience podcast with President Trump a couple of weeks before the election, an interview that racked up millions of views and is credited with helping turn out the young male vote in numbers that pushed Trump to victory. But after Trump's episode dropped, there were plenty of conversations about whether Kamala would also be appearing on the most popular podcast in the world. There was obviously a lot of benefit to Kamala to sit down with Rogan. His audience is largely made up of younger males, which is the demographic that the vice president struggled with the most. But Harris had spent much of the campaign appearing on female-oriented podcasts like Call Her Daddy and doing carefully-scripted interviews. There was a ton of risk to having her sit down with Rogan for a three-hour, free-wheeling interview where nothing was off limits. Ultimately, it became clear that the interview with Rogan wouldn't happen, a decision which has been heavily scrutinized in the wake of her loss. And at the time, Rogan appeared to point the finger at the Harris campaign, claiming that he was willing to have her in his Austin, Texas studio any time she wanted, but that the campaign insisted that he come to them and that the interview be limited to an hour - which isn't really how his podcast works. An excerpt from an upcoming book, FIGHT: Inside the Wildest Battle for the White House by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes, was released last week that seemed to place the blame on the failed interview on Rogan rather than the Kamala Harris campaign. According to the book, her deputy campaign manager reached out to Rogan in early October to attempt to schedule an interview. And they claim that the podcaster's staff outlined his conditions, including no staff in the studio, no topic restrictions, and Harris would have to sign a waiver ahead of the episode. Oh, and she would have to come to Austin to record it. Now, Texas was never really in play for Harris, so her campaign didn't really see much reason to be there. But then, her campaign announced a rally in Texas, which came as a surprise to pretty much everybody who was paying attention to the election. The campaign claims that the rally was really just an excuse to get Harris close to Austin to record the interview with Rogan, and that aides even did a walk-through of his studio to scope things out while offering Rogan the in-person interview he wanted in Austin on October 25. But the authors say that when they made the offer to Rogan, they were told that he was taking a "personal day" that day - instead offering to record early the next day. Well long story short, the interview never worked out. And it turns out the "personal day" that Rogan had blocked out on his calendar was actually to record his interview with President Trump, something which apparently upset the Harris campaign after they found out. And to make matters worse, the campaign also thought they had secured Beyonce to perform at the rally in Houston, but instead the singer refused to sing and would only speak. Tough scene. The only problem is that Rogan claims the entire story is bullshit. The podcaster addressed the book's claims on today's episode of his podcast, accusing the Harris campaign of lying to cover up their own mistakes: "They said a bunch of things that weren't true... They didn't talk to us, which is kind of crazy. Didn't even ask. But they said things that just weren't true." Rogan addressed the accusation that he had "lied" about taking a personal day on the day Trump was booked: "No, we just didn't tell you that Trump was coming on. He was already booked a long time ago. This is how it worked: Trump was really easy to book. Like, super easy. We offered one day, he said yes, that was it. There was no, 'What are we going to talk about? How long is it going to be? Is it going to be edited?' There was nothing. 'What's the waiver?' 'Here, give me that waiver.' Signed it. It was so easy. So he was already booked. They never committed to doing the show." Rogan says that the idea that the Houston rally was scheduled so that they would be in town to do the show is a lie - because the campaign never committed to do the show in the first place. And he also claims that they never sent anybody to tour the studio in advance of the episode: "That's not true. The Trump administration did... Maybe you can kind of get away with saying that because the Secret Service came down here for Trump and looked around that 'we' sent someone down, but it was not. It was the Trump administration that sent 'em down, because they were the only ones that had a date to do the show. These people didn't have a date. They never agreed to do the show." He says that after the Trump episode, they made the offer for Rogan to do the interview in DC, but limited it to an hour. And the host says that he even offered to record the Harris interview on the same day that Trump was in his studio. But the Harris campaign apparently presented a list of demands that Rogan wasn't willing to agree to: "They wanted a stenographer in the room, they wanted staff in the room... Trump was just in here by himself...for three hours. They wanted it very controlled, and they were really concerned that it wasn't going to be edited. So I don't think they were ever really sure that they wanted to do it." And he says that when the Harris campaign saw the reaction to the Trump interview and offered him an opportunity to record the show in DC, the campaign couldn't even assure him that Harris was willing to do the interview: "My manager asked, 'Is she committed to doing this?' 'No, she hasn't committed to doing this.' Have you brought this to her? They wouldn't even say whether or not she had expressed willingness to do it, or whether they were trying to convince her to do it." Rogan clearly disagrees with the characterization from the Harris campaign, but he also says that he has the receipts to prove he's telling the truth: "They never committed to doing it. We have all the receipts, by the way. I have a whole list of conversations that took place. They never said she was going to do it. So this whole idea that we fucked her over, and that we fucked her over for Trump, incorrect. Just not true. But I think it's someone trying to cover their ass for the fact that she never did it, and that if she did do it, it might have a positive effect." Sounds like the two sides are going to have to agree to disagree on this one. https://youtu.be/Ol7PofIyZPI?si=DSrV7dt9tFN0UqcS&t=5151