Few Democrats are as influential or as politically powerful as South Carolina

Congressman James Clyburn, a long time ally of President Biden's.

Clyburn was quick to throw his support behind Kamala Harris as the Democrats presidential

nominee which helped to consolidate the party's support for her.

And Congressman Clyburn joins us now.

Thanks so much for being with us.

Well, thank you very much for having me. Most folks know you as the

elder statesman who saved Joe Biden's campaign back in 2020 or one of his

closest allies and I understand he called you moments before he dropped out of

this race. What did he tell you? Well he

told me he admitted the decision not to continue the campaign and he read me his statement and asked what I thought and I told

him I thought it was a good statement but it was missing something and I said to him I didn't

think it would be the prudent thing to do to leave the stage and not endorse the Vice President to succeed him.

So the original statement didn't have the endorsement of Kamala Harris?

No, it didn't.

And he told me when I said that to him he says I plan to issue a second

statement within the hour and that will be an endorsement. And 30 minutes

later he did issue a second statement and it was the endorsement.

Do you think he would have done that without your encouragement?

I think so. I think he'd already made up his mind to do so. I had no way of knowing that and so I said

what I said. He told me what he did and he did what he said.

You know for all of the focus on the ceremonial passing of the torch from Biden to Harris,

...