Kamala Harris is running for president. Here's everything to know about her life, career, history, and policy views.
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- Kamala Harris is running for president after Joe Biden dropped out of the 2024 election.
- Harris made history as the first vice president who is a woman, Black, or of Indian descent.
- She previously served as a US senator and attorney general of California.
Kamala Harris is running for president.
The current vice president and former senator from California began her campaign after President Joe Biden ended his re-election bid and threw his support behind her as the 2024 Democratic nominee.
When Biden endorsed Harris, he said in a statement that choosing her to be vice president was "the best decision I've made." A wave of endorsements and grassroots enthusiasm for Harris quickly followed.
Harris's campaign raised $81 million in its first 24 hours, breaking the record for the biggest single-day rise in presidential campaign history. Out of the 888,000 grassroots donors who contributed, 60% gave money for the first time this election cycle.
Harris secured the endorsements of dozens of powerful Democratic lawmakers and donors, and is expected to officially become the nominee at the Democratic National Convention, which begins on August 19.
Here's a look at the history and career of America's groundbreaking vice president.
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Kamala Harris' early life, family, and upbringing
Kamala Devi Harris was born on October 20, 1964 in Oakland, California.
Harris' mother, Shyamala Gopalan Harris, immigrated to the US from India. Her father, Donald Harris, immigrated to the US from Jamaica. They met as graduate students at UC Berkeley and divorced when Harris was young.
As the daughter of two immigrants, Harris' multiracial identity has made for a historic political career — Harris identifies as both Black and South Asian-American, and is the first person of either race to be elected vice president.
Harris has one younger sister named Maya Lakshmi Harris, a lawyer who served as a senior policy advisor for Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign and the campaign chairperson for Harris' 2020 run.
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Harris grew up in Berkeley, where she attended Thousand Oaks Elementary School. As a child, Harris took a bus that transported her to a predominantly white neighborhood as part of desegregation efforts.
One of the most memorable moments of the 2020 Democratic presidential primary came during a debate when Harris, addressing Biden, said: "There was a little girl in California who was part of the second class to integrate her public schools, and she was bused to school every day, and that little girl was me," before criticizing Biden's opposition to federally mandated busing in the 1970s.
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Biden responded: "I did not oppose busing in America. What I opposed is busing ordered by the Department of Education. That's what I opposed."
Harris went to college at Howard University, a historically Black university, in 1986, and graduated with a degree in political science and economics. She was also a member of the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority.
Harris went to law school at the University of California Hastings College of Law.
Kamala Harris' legal career as a California prosecutor
Harris worked as a deputy district attorney for Alameda County in Oakland prosecuting murder, rape, assault, and drug cases.
She then served as district attorney of San Francisco from 2004 to 2011. Harris was the first woman to serve as the district attorney of San Francisco and the first Black woman and the first South Asian woman to hold that office in California.
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During her time as district attorney, Harris instituted "Back on Track," a reentry program "aimed at reducing recidivism among low-level drug-trafficking defendants."
Harris became the attorney general of California in 2011. During her six years as attorney general, she litigated against mortgage companies, for-profit colleges, and human trafficking, securing major settlements for the state.
Donald Trump donated to two of Harris' bids for attorney general. As a private citizen, he donated $5,000 to her 2011 campaign and $1,000 in 2013. Ivanka Trump also donated $2,000 in 2014.
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In 2017, Harris became the second Black woman and first American of South Asian ancestry to be elected to the US Senate. She served on multiple Senate committees — the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, the Select Committee on Intelligence, the Committee on the Judiciary, and the Committee on the Budget.
Harris often won praise for her prosecutorial lines of questioning during congressional hearings. The Harris campaign has also capitalized on Harris, a former prosecutor, running against Trump, a convicted felon.
Kamala Harris' ascent to the vice presidency
Harris launched a presidential bid for the 2020 Democratic nomination in January 2019, but dropped out that December.
Biden won the nomination and chose Harris as his running mate.
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As vice president, Harris has been a key player in the Biden administration's policy agenda, casting more tie-breaking votes in the Senate than any other vice president in history. Her tie-breaking votes passed the 2021 American Rescue Plan, a $1.9 trillion stimulus focused on economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, and the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, the Biden administration's $20 billion plan to invest in clean energy.
Biden tasked Harris with addressing the root causes of migration and the surge of immigrants seeking asylum at the southern US border. Republicans have seized on the issue of illegal immigration amid the influx of migrants in US cities, and have accused Harris of failing as the Biden administration's "border czar." Democrats have pushed back against the label and said Harris' role was not to manage the border, but to coordinate diplomatic relations with Mexico and Central American countries.
Kamala Harris' stances on key issues
Harris did not immediately unveil a platform when she launched her presidential campaign, and many of her views on specific policies remain unknown or hazy. But her actions as vice president, and remarks on the campaign trail so far, have lent some insight into certain policy positions.
Harris strongly supports abortion rights. As vice president, she has served as a leading voice of the Biden administration on the issue, holding Trump responsible for the fall of Roe v. Wade and becoming the first sitting president or vice president to visit an abortion clinic. At her first 2024 campaign rally, she pledged to sign a law restoring reproductive freedoms as president.
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Harris supports a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. After the Hamas terrorist attacks in Israel on October 7, 2023, Harris condemned Hamas as a "barbaric terrorist organization," affirmed Israel's right to self-defense, and met with the families of American hostages held by Hamas in Gaza.
Harris has also pushed for Israel to increase humanitarian aid in Gaza to alleviate the region's "humanitarian catastrophe" and called for an "immediate cease-fire." In March 2024, she echoed the Biden administration's opposition to Israel's invasion of Rafah in southern Gaza.
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Harris supports NATO and the Ukrainian war effort following Russia's invasion. In June 2024, Harris announced the administration's $1.5 billion aid package to help repair Ukraine's infrastructure, support humanitarian aid, and provide equipment to Ukrainian border guards and law enforcement.
Harris has long been on the front lines of LGBTQ+ rights. Two years before same-sex marriage was legalized nationwide, Harris famously told a Los Angeles County clerk to "start the marriages immediately" when California's same-sex marriage ban was overturned in 2013. As vice president, Harris supported White House initiatives to bolster LGBTQ+ rights and protections.
Who has endorsed Kamala Harris's presidential campaign
President Joe Biden endorsed Harris minutes after announcing that he had ended his bid for president. Democratic leaders and lawmakers followed, including former president Bill Clinton and 2016 Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, former president Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama, former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer.
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Harris also secured endorsements from business leaders including Sheryl Sandberg, Reed Hastings, Melinda French Gates, and George Soros.
Kamala Harris' husband and stepchildren
Harris has been married to Doug Emhoff, a former entertainment lawyer, since 2014. They met on a blind date set up by a mutual friend.
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Harris had not been married before. Emhoff was previously married to Kerstin Emhoff, a film producer. They divorced in 2008.
Emhoff was a partner at the law firm DLA Piper until he left his career behind to support Harris as vice president. In addition to fulfilling his duties as second gentleman, he teaches entertainment law at Georgetown University.
Emhoff is the first Jewish spouse of a vice president in US history.
Harris previously dated Willie Brown, who served as the California State Assembly speaker, in the mid-1990s. The couple ended their relationship before Brown became the mayor of San Francisco in 1996. Harris also briefly dated talk show host Montel Williams in the early 2000s.
Harris does not have any biological children. She is a stepparent to Emhoff's two children from his previous marriage, Cole Emhoff and Ella Emhoff, who nicknamed her "Momala."
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Cole Emhoff studied psychology at Colorado College and works in the entertainment industry. According to his IMDB profile, he worked as an assistant on the 2020 film "Minari" and the 2022 remake of "Father of the Bride."
Ella Emhoff graduated from Parsons School of Design and works as a model and knitwear fashion designer. In 2021, she signed with the modeling agency IMG.
Forbes estimated Harris and Doug Emhoff's net worth at around $8 million. The couple owns a four-bedroom, 3,500-square-foot home in Brentwood, California, worth about $4.4 million.
Michael Tullberg
Harris earns a salary of $218,000 a year as vice president. She also received over $500,000 in advances for her books, "Smart on Crime: A Career Prosecutor's Plan to Make Us Safer," "The Truths We Hold: An American Journey," and a children's book called "Superheroes are Everywhere."
Can Kamala Harris beat Trump?
Both Harris and Trump are facing a tough election battle.
Trump's approval rating was a historically low 34% upon leaving office in 2021. But he gained momentum with voters when he hit the campaign trail again, defeating all Republican challengers in the 2024 primaries. Surviving an assassination attempt at a Pennsylvania rally on July 13, 2024, just days before the Republican National Convention also galvanized support for the former president.
Harris was deeply unpopular in the first year of her vice presidency. In 2021, Harris' approval rating reached a historic low of 28% — even lower than Vice President Dick Cheney's worst numbers. Her popularity surged after Biden's exit from the race with her campaign raising a record $81 million in the 24 hours after Biden dropped out. Of the 888,000 grassroots donors who contributed, 60% were first-time donors.
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Her candidacy energized younger voters and minorities, sparking memes inspired by Charli XCX's "Brat" album and a speech in which she quoted her mother saying "You think you just fell out of a coconut tree?" In July 2024, Trump raised $137 million while Harris raised $310 million, with 10 times as many Gen Z donors contributing to Harris' campaign than had donated to Biden's in June 2024.
Running against Harris has also set off Trump's tendency to cross the line while criticizing women, such as an appearance at a conference for Black journalists where he questioned if Harris was really Black.
Juliana Kaplan, Debanjali Bose, and Joshua Nelken-Zitser contributed to a previous version of this story.
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