The real Kamala Harris: What her California years reveal

By Ben Christopher (CALMATTERS) – Whether President Joe Biden bows to the growing chorus of elected Democrats and Democratic voters calling for him to exit the 2024 race, or continues to seek a second term as a visibly frail 81-year-old, suddenly everyone is taking another good hard look at Kamala Harris. Vice presidents rarely get much attention. What attention Harris has gotten on the job hasn’t been particularly positive. Counter to the reputation she cultivated early on in the campaign trail as a pragmatic politician and sharp-minded prosecutor, public opinion on Harris soured in the summer of 2021 and has mostly stayed sour.. That was in part thanks to the White House saddling her with a series of unenviable and intractable tasks. Beyond that her role, like that of most vice presidents, has been high on profile, but low on actual responsibility. It’s a job perhaps best described by fictional Veep Selina Meyer as the political equivalent of being “declawed, defanged, neutered, ball-gagged, and sealed in an abandoned coal mine.” Nor was Harris faring much better with voters in her home state. Last year 59% of California voters in a Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies poll said they would not...