As the results started to pour in on Tuesday night last week, an optimistic mood in Kamala Harris's team quickly dimmed.

With the writing on the wall, Harris herself went to bed, refusing to concede defeat to Donald Trump until the following afternoon. By then, a Democratic blame game was already in full force. 

'It's a blood bath,' one observer noted of the rabid infighting – with no one spared humiliation.

President Biden and VP Harris broke bread on Tuesday when they lunched together for the first time in months. But there are no signs that the private time in the small dining room off the Oval Office has healed the hard feelings between the two sides.

Harris's most loyal aides are putting her loss squarely on President Joe Biden – for his poor record on inflation and immigration, for his many verbal fumbles and, most importantly, for refusing to drop out of the race sooner.

Some insiders described the president as an '81-year-old albatross hanging around Harris's neck.'

On Friday last week, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi – who is widely believed to have helped force Biden to step down – went a step further, brutally telling the New York Times: 'Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race… there would be an open primary.'

The suggestion: A properly competitive race would have allowed a stronger candidate than Harris to emerge as nominee.

But Team Biden isn't taking this lying down.

In fact, as he addressed Harris's defeat in a speech from the White House Rose Garden on Thursday last week, many present pointed out that he appeared to be enjoying himself.

One White House insider was keen to suggest that – given the size of Trump's victory – there was no way Harris would have been able to pull together a win, even if she'd had more time to campaign.

Meanwhile, Biden loyalists are now at pains to remind people that he is the only person to have successfully defeated Donald Trump in an election – and that, before this summer, Harris ranked as the most unpopular vice president in history.

The president and First Lady Jill Biden did not join Harris's official election watch party on the night itself.

Certainly, there have long been rumors of tension between Jill and Harris.

Most memorably, when Harris made her first bid for the presidency back in the 2020 race, Jill reportedly raged that Harris should 'go f***' herself after she'd accused Joe Biden of racism during a televised Democratic primary debate.