Did Kamala Harris use a teleprompter during her September 2024 interview with Oprah Winfrey? No, that's not true: The teleprompter seen in a video clip online is placed well out of Harris' line of vision -- and in the full version of the interview, Harris does not turn her head to peek at it. The device was actually facing Winfrey, who took cues from words displayed on its screen.
The claim appeared in a video on X on September 21, 2024 (archived here). The caption read:
WOW! Apparently Kamala Harris had a freaking TELEPROMPTER during her 'interview' with Oprah
Scamala Harris is a fraud!
This is how the post looked on X at the time of writing:
(Source: X screenshot taken on Mon Sept. 23 14:48:25 2024 UTC)
The video in the X post is slightly blurry and was shot from the area where the audience was sitting. It is likely an amateur recording of the event.
The full version of TV host Winfrey's interview with Democratic presidential candidate Harris on September 19, 2024, which was livestreamed on Harris' official YouTube channel, shows that there was indeed a teleprompter in the studio where the interview took place. The teleprompter can be seen in this screenshot from the 1:30:16 mark:
(Source: YouTube screenshot taken on Mon Sept 23 15:25:37 2024 UTC)
However, the teleprompter is pointed at the chair where Winfrey, not Harris, was sitting. Harris' chair (red arrow on the right below) faces away from the device (red arrow on the left below) throughout the interview, as seen in this screenshot from the 1:08:29 mark:
(Source: YouTube screenshot taken on Mon Sept 23 16:02:05 2024 UTC)
The only times Harris noticeably turns her head toward the teleprompter for a prolonged period are at the 25:13 mark, when she greets Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, and at the 26:52 mark, when she briefly addresses Jotaka Eaddy, founder of the activist group Win With Black Women. Both Whitmer and Eaddy were sitting near the teleprompter, and Harris' brief words of thanks to them were not the kind that would require a crib sheet.
Further proof that the teleprompter was there to assist Winfrey, not Harris, is the fact that Winfrey is the one taking cues from it. At the 0:02 mark of the X clip, the teleprompter screen reads "LET'S GET TO SHELBY, SHELBY IS IN OUR [illegible] AUDIENCE." At the 41:50 mark of the YouTube video, Winfrey turns to a guest on a video screen and says:
I want to just introduce (you), too, to Shelby, who's also in our virtual audience.
At the 0:03 mark of the X clip, the words "THE FIGHT FOR [illegible] THE FIGHT FOR THE AMERICA WE DESIRE AND DESERVE TO LIVE IN." In Winfrey's closing remarks at the 1:32:21 mark of the YouTube video, she says:
Vice President Harris, we thank you. We hope you keep fighting for us and the country we deserve to have.
More Lead Stories fact checks of claims about Kamala Harris can be read here; more fact checks about the 2024 presidential election are here.
