Political journalist Charlie Spiering begins his new book about Vice President Kamala Harris with an account of a somber White House meeting. At the gathering, top aides and the first lady come to grips with age and infirmity that have caught up with President Joe Biden.

“They can no longer hide the truth,” Spiering writes: Biden’s time in office is over, and Harris will take control.

Spiering wrote the words last year, setting the scene in “the near future” and making clear it was just one possible way that things could play out. At the time, he recalled, the prologue “felt far off and a little sensational.” But over the past month, the fictional scene that Spiering used to open his nonfiction book has veered closer to reality.

Biden’s support among Democratic Party power brokers plummeted after a feeble debate performance that reignited concerns about the 81-year-old’s fitness for a second term. After weeks of pressure, Biden announced Sunday that he was abandoning his reelection bid, calling the decision “in the best interest of my party and the country.”

He immediately endorsed Harris to serve as the Democrats’ new nominee.

When Spiering began promoting his book months ago, he said many people questioned why he had decided to focus on the vice president. He often answered that, “there’s a very real possibility she could be the 47th president of the United States.”

“And I think that’s coming through right now,” Spiering said at a July 9 event at the Powell Library at the fairgrounds.

His book, “Amateur Hour: Kamala Harris in the White House,” takes a particularly dim view of a potential Harris presidency, suggesting the reason Biden had to run for a second term was that Harris “was not up to the job.”

Spiering describes the vice president as a “hilarious, incompetent, trailblazing radical,” calls her first years in office as “disastrous and comical” and says Democrats have privately lost faith in her leadership.

Through the course of his reporting, “I was surprised to find that not many people in Washington actually like or care about Kamala Harris,” Spiering told the Tribune. “And I fully expected to hear from her defenders … but I didn’t get that. Like, speaking to people in Washington, it’s shocking how, behind the scenes, they really don’t like her and they don’t see her as having a [political] future.”

From Powell to the Capitol

Spiering grew up in Powell, and although he’s now based in D.C., working as a senior political reporter for the London-based Daily Mail, he still describes himself as a “Wyoming farm kid.” He squeezed in this month’s talk while vacationing in Powell.

Spiering has worked for multiple prominent media outlets considered to lean toward the right side of the political spectrum, including the Washington Examiner and Breitbart News. But he stepped away from the daily news grind last year to write “Amateur Hour.”

Although Harris has spent most of her life in the public eye — including as San Francisco’s district attorney, California’s attorney general and as a U.S. senator — Spiering said he felt no one had taken a real critical look at her background and record.

As a journalist, “the idea of scrutinizing a popular public figure who hasn’t got the scrutiny, I think that’s every writer’s dream, right?” he said.

Spiering said his past work for right-leaning publications generated “a lot” of skepticism from sources as he went about his reporting, but he found many people formerly in Harris’ orbit willing to talk.

“Washington can be quite cruel behind the scenes,” he said.

Spiering began writing in January 2023 and completed his first draft around July. The publishing powerhouse Simon & Schuster shipped his book to customers and retailers in January. His work drew the favorable attention of conservative commentator Tucker Carlson and landed him appearances on The Ben Shapiro Show, The Hill TV, Jesse Watters Primetime on Fox News, and C-SPAN’s Washington Journal. He’s been in higher demand following recent events.

Spiering’s July 9 talk drew a crowd of dozens to the Heart Mountain Hall meeting room, including family members and state Rep. Rachel Rodriguez-Williams (R-Cody). The lawmaker sported a T-shirt with the hashtag #QueMala — a Spanish phrase that sounds similar to “Kamala” but means “so bad” — for the occasion.

Rodriguez-Williams has called “Amateur Hour” a “great read if you want to learn about who exactly she [Harris] is.”

Critiquing her candidacy

In his book, Spiering lays out a number of critiques of Harris, writing that she bullied staff, gave speeches that “spiraled into word salads,” focused on her own brand and refused to be a team player in the Biden administration. And in an era where authenticity has become a valuable political currency, the journalist sees Harris as artificial.

“I think that’s why [former President Donald] Trump does so well, because every time he opens his mouth and speaks, what you see is what you get … you feel like you understand who Trump is, regardless of whether you like him or not,” Spiering said. “With Kamala Harris, she lacks authenticity. And I think that that’s her biggest fault as she goes forward …”

Many in the party wanted to see Biden removed from the ticket, Spiering noted in his July 9 talk, but “based on conversations I’ve had with Democratic leaders and strategists, I don’t think they fully understand what it will mean to have Kamala Harris run for office.”

For more about “Amateur Hour,” visit tinyurl.com/mrx5tera.