Harris is leaning into her history as a prosecutor. It's not the first time
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Kamala Harris, then the San Francisco district attorney, poses for a portrait on June 18, 2004.Marcio Jose Sanchez / AP -
Then-California Attorney General Kamala Harris briefs the media after raids on money laundering operations in Los Angeles on Sept. 10, 2014.Mark Ralston / AFP via Getty Images -
Former President Donald Trump leaves the courthouse after he was found guilty in his hush money trial at Manhattan Criminal Court on May 30, 2024.Pool / Getty Images -
Vice President Harris speaks with police officers after a shooting that left seven people dead in Highland Park, Ill., on July 5, 2022.Kamil Krzaczynski / AFP via Getty Images
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Two days before President Biden announced he would step back from his push for a second term, his campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon appeared on television, insisting the president would stay in the race.
“He is the best person to take on Donald Trump and prosecute that case,” Dillon said.
But about 72 hours later, it was instead Vice President Harris making that same argument — and reviving a case she had made in 2019, when she ran in a crowded Democratic field seeking the nomination that year.
“Before I was elected as vice president, before I was elected as United States senator, I was the elected attorney general, as I've mentioned, of California. And before that, I was a courtroom prosecutor,” Harris said to campaign staffers in Wilmington, Del., on the day after Biden endorsed her to take his place at the top of the Democratic ticket.
“In those roles, I took on perpetrators of all kinds — predators who abused women, fraudsters who ripped off consumers, cheaters who broke the rules for their own gain. So, hear me when I say: I know Donald Trump's type,” Harris said, in a line that has become the centerpiece of her whirlwind campaign.
It’s rhetoric Harris has used before
Back in 2019, when she first ran for president, Harris’ campaign was centered on her career as a prosecutor. Her slogan was “for the people,” which is how Harris would introduce herself in court.
Her pitch to voters is the same that it is today: that with her background as a prosecutor, she is the best person to take on Trump.
But five years ago, Harris’ record as a prosecutor was a liability in her campaign. She faced attacks from her Democratic opponents in the primary debates on her record with marijuana and on cracking down on truancy rates. Voters on the left referred to Harris as a cop.
“And they didn’t mean that as a compliment,” said Paul Butler, a law professor at Georgetown, himself a former public prosecutor.
The message hits differently in 2024
This time around, though, Butler said Harris’ history of being a prosecutor might be perceived by voters differently — because voters’ perceptions of public safety, criminal justice and Trump have changed.
“In some ways, the prosecution of Donald Trump has flipped the way that some progressives and some conservatives think about our criminal legal system," Butler said. "Now, a lot of people that are on the left are all-in on prosecuting, holding Donald Trump accountable."
Butler said Harris will likely use her experience as a prosecutor to try to highlight her centrist politics.
“Her message to more conservative audiences will be that her policies as district attorney and California state attorney general demonstrate that she’s not soft on crime,” Butler said. “But her message to progressive audiences will be that her prosecutorial experiences give her unique expertise on the problems in the system, and how to fix them.”
Harris' pitch was to be "smart" on crime
Trying to tack to the middle on justice issues has long been a part of Harris' strategy.
In 2003, Harris, a courtroom prosecutor, launched her first political campaign, running for district attorney of San Francisco.
She rejected the idea that law enforcement officials either had to be tough on crime or soft on crime, said David Chiu, a friend who was part of Harris' "kitchen cabinet" at the time. Instead, she wanted to be “smart” on crime, he said.
“It’s all about getting those conviction rates up, but at the same time thinking about what recidivism rates are and using data to manage reform and accountability,” said Chiu, now San Francisco city attorney.
When Harris became district attorney, she started initiatives like Back on Track, a job training program for people who were first-time nonviolent offenders. Supporters of Harris say that the program, and other efforts by Harris, were ahead of her time.
But some other efforts received criticism — especially her work to cut down on truancy that criminalized parents whose kids were missing school. That history was one that concerned many voters in 2019.
Allies like Chiu, though, said times have changed. “It was a very different time in 2003 than it is in '24,” Chiu said.
Transcript
MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
Vice President Harris has a pitch for voters. She can prosecute the case against former President Donald Trump. She has been leaning into her history as a prosecutor. As NPR White House correspondent Deepa Shivaram reports, it's a strategy that has not always worked for Harris.
DEEPA SHIVARAM, BYLINE: In 1998, David Chiu was starting out his law career in San Francisco. One afternoon, he got a call from his boss.
DAVID CHIU: And I was told to go check out the closing argument of an experienced prosecutor named Kamala.
SHIVARAM: This was five years before Kamala Harris ran her first political campaign. She was working in the district attorney's office and was known for her skills in the courtroom.
CHIU: How methodical she was at demolishing the other side and just how comfortable she was in the battle of the courtroom but I would also say just her sheer charisma. She had juries eating out of her hand.
SHIVARAM: Harris knew she wanted to be a prosecutor by the time she arrived at law school. She also knew she wanted to work in public service. It was at that time she met Diane Matsuda.
DIANE MATSUDA: There are just a lot of stereotypes about what a prosecutor is.
SHIVARAM: Matsuda said that most people think of prosecutors as white and male, and there's data to back that up.
MATSUDA: Kamala broke that mold.
SHIVARAM: But for her family, Harris' decision to break that mold came as a shock because Harris' family grew up going to protests. Her parents met while active in the civil rights movement. So to decide to go work at the district attorney's office - here's Harris explaining that choice in a speech to the NAACP in 2019.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
KAMALA HARRIS: My family gathered round. And they said, OK, Kamala, so what are you going to do in your fight for the justice? What are you going to do in your fight for justice? And I got all excited, and I said, well, I'm going to be a prosecutor. Well, now, if you have any sense of who my family is, you will know that, at best, they found it a curious decision. And with some of them, I had to defend the decision like one would a thesis.
SHIVARAM: In that speech, Harris said she was clear-eyed about how prosecutors have historically treated Black people. But she thought it was important to be on the inside of the system. In 2003, she decided to run for office as district attorney of San Francisco. But Harris wanted to do things differently. She wanted to reject the idea of being either tough or soft on crime. She invited friends over to her kitchen table in the early days of the campaign to strategize. She said she wanted to be smart on crime. Here's David Chiu again.
CHIU: It was all about getting those conviction rates up but, at the same time, thinking about what your recidivism rates are and using data to manage reform and accountability.
SHIVARAM: Once in office, Harris started initiatives like Back on Track, a job training program for people who were first-time drug offenders. Advocates say the program was ahead of its time. But some efforts by Harris weren't as well-received, like her plan to cut truancy rates, which penalized parents whose kids were missing school. Then came her first campaign for president five years ago. She tried to frame it as she is today - that her legal skills would help her fight Trump.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
HARRIS: And I've prosecuted a lot of cases but rarely one with this much evidence.
SHIVARAM: But her opponents, including Joe Biden, attacked her on the debate stage about her record as a prosecutor. Left-leaning Democrats referred to Harris as a cop. Harris' campaign was never able to fully move past the criticism. Her smart-on-crime approach ended up leaving a lot of voters unsure about where she stood. But this time around, things might be different, says Paul Butler, a law professor at Georgetown and a former public prosecutor, in part because of Trump's convictions.
PAUL BUTLER: In some ways, the prosecutions of Donald Trump have flipped the ways that some progressives and some conservatives think about our criminal legal system.
SHIVARAM: Butler says how people think about justice and public safety has shifted in five years. What hasn't shifted is Harris' pitch to voters to send her to the White House. It's the same pitch she made to her family when she graduated law school. She's better suited to make change on the inside. Deepa Shivaram, NPR News.
(SOUNDBITE OF JONUFF SONG, "LAZY LAND") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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