Together with Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, US Vice President Kamala Harris will participate in her first interview as the Democratic Party's official presidential nominee on Thursday.

Republicans and other pundits have criticized Ms. Harris for not holding a press conference or an in-depth, taped interview until today.

In Savannah, Georgia, the interview with CNN's Dana Bash will be prerecorded.

Thursday night at 21:00 Eastern time (02:00 BST Friday) is when it will air.

Ms Harris has taken brief questions from journalists and social media influencers since securing the nomination shortly after President Joe Biden ended his campaign on 21 July.

However the CNN appearance will mark the first time since Mr Biden's abrupt exit that she has sat down for an interview in which she could face questions about her policy agenda and prior record.

Ms Harris promised nearly three weeks ago to schedule an interview before the end of August.

In the meantime, Republicans repeatedly accused her of dodging questions from the media.

Former President Donald Trump, her Republican challenger, continued the line of attack in an interview with the Daily Mail.

"Why isn't it live?" he said in a clip of the interview posted online. "It's not a live interview. It's an interview that's going to be taped and then edited and then put out. So that's not even an interview. Then she's doing it with her vice president (nominee) sitting there."

In January, CNN journalist Ms Bash moderated a Republican primary debate between Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis, and she was also one of the moderators of the 27 June debate between Mr Biden and Trump.

Mr Biden performance in that debate was widely seen as calamitous and accelerated calls for him to withdraw from the race.

Ms Harris's last sit-down TV interview was with CNN’s Anderson Cooper shortly after the June debate.

The Harris-Walz campaign is currently on a bus tour of Georgia, a key southern state where Mr Biden narrowly edged Trump in 2020 – the first time a Democrat won the state since Bill Clinton in 1992.

The presidential candidates will face off in a debate aired on ABC News on 10 September.