Polls present that Kamala Harris holds about 50% of California voters’ approval as she heads right into a self-assigned summer time of determination making about her political future.
Does the previous vp who misplaced final 12 months’s election by simply 1.6% of the favored vote wish to hand over on the potential for succeeding Donald Trump as president? Is she able to cope with all of the detailed and sophisticated points that always confront any California governor? Can she elevate the minimal of $100 million or in order that’s wanted to be a reputable candidate for governor?
These are simply a number of the gadgets on Harris’s thoughts as she disapprovingly watches Trump run the federal government in a confrontational method utterly international to her. She is aware of if she doesn’t run for president in 2028, although, that she’s going to forfeit any benefit she would possess as a barely crushed candidate final day out, one whose defeat now has many 2024 Trump voters feeling a little bit of purchaser’s regret.
She additionally is aware of that if she goes for governor, she must promise to serve out a full time period in that workplace ought to she win. Reneging on that pledge would possible doom her in any presidential main election, tagging her as a promise breaker. Retaining such a pledge additionally takes her out of the 2028 presidential working, although.
It’s a uncommon quandary no earlier California Democrat has confronted. The large query for Harris, who shall be 63 on Election Day 2026 is that this: Does she care sufficient in regards to the particulars of California points from electrical automobile mandates to Medi-Cal for the undocumented to surrender on her nationwide ambitions, not less than for many of her 60s?
Harris bears the picture of a surfacy politician for positive. Rivals additionally blame her for failing to reveal simply how disabled former President Joe Biden turned. Few can title salient achievements of both her six years as state lawyer basic or her 4 years as Biden’s second in command.
A few of these are substantial: Throughout California’s fiscal disaster of 2009 via 2012, when many hundreds of mortgages have been threatened with foreclosures, she leveraged the state’s sheer dimension to extend its share of a 2012 nationwide mortgage settlement to $18 billion from an preliminary prime supply of $4 billion, serving to an unknown however massive variety of Californians evade foreclosures.
Between 2013 and 2015, her workplace recouped greater than $1 billion for the state’s main public worker retirement funds after banks and ranking businesses lied to vastly overvalue mortgage-backed securities. She additionally secured a 2012 settlement with Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon and HP to require that each one apps they promote show clear new privateness insurance policies — after which she created a state privateness enforcement unit to seal that deal.
Her document was much less noteworthy as vp, partly as a result of Biden assigned her inconceivable duties equivalent to fixing situations in Latin America that encourage unlawful immigration. That task didn’t include the facility to make any enhancements.
So the Harris picture as a light-weight, promoted partially by her cackling responses in some interviews, will be deceptive and different candidates for governor could be smart to not underestimate her. That key query stays, although: How is Harris in pursuing the state’s issues all the way in which to options, from the destiny of the partially-built bullet prepare to the pesky and costly concern of caring for indigent immigrants?
Nobody actually is aware of, maybe not even Harris. That’s what makes this query so important for a marketing campaign wherein different candidates equivalent to former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and former state Lawyer Basic and federal U.S. Well being Secretary Xavier Becerra are identified for his or her sturdy curiosity in taking over main points. Candidates like former state Senate President Toni Atkins and former state Controller Betty Yee are equally identified for sturdy focus.
If Harris runs and debates all of them, plus Republicans Steve Hilton and Chad Bianco, they may absolutely be attempting to color her because the light-weight of her fame and never the achieved politician of her actuality. Which makes working a giant danger for Harris, who may lose out as a serious nationwide participant if she enters this race, no matter whether or not she wins or loses.
Initially Revealed: June 10, 2025 at 5:00 AM PDT
