From courtroom to candidate: What Harris's years as a prosecutor tell us about her

Just implicit 3 months ago, Vice-President Kamala Harris walked up to a microphone to marque a code that would specify some her past and her future.

A time before, President Joe Biden had dropped retired of the predetermination contention and endorsed her to win him arsenic Democratic candidate. With lone a abbreviated play of campaigning up of her, Harris had nary clip to waste.

There is simply a saying successful politics: specify yourself oregon beryllium defined by your opponent. And successful that moment, erstwhile Harris made her archetypal transportation to the American people, she defined herself not conscionable successful presumption of her grounds successful the White House oregon arsenic a US senator, but the years she spent arsenic a California prosecutor.

“I took connected perpetrators of each kinds - predators who abused women, fraudsters who ripped disconnected consumers, cheaters who broke the rules for their ain gain. So, perceive maine erstwhile I say: I cognize Donald Trump's type,” she said of her Republican challenger.

The enactment has been repeated often astatine her run rallies and stump speeches, arsenic the 60-year-old has sought to framework this predetermination arsenic a contention betwixt a hard-bitten authoritative and a convicted felon, perpetually reminding voters of Trump’s ineligible troubles.

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But a look backmost astatine Harris’s clip successful and retired of California's courtrooms reveals her enduring conflict to specify herself, what her opponents accidental is simply a past of pivoting connected issues depending connected the governmental weather, arsenic good arsenic her uncanny quality to prehend the infinitesimal erstwhile others person counted her out.

Harris’s clip successful instrumentality enforcement began conscionable retired of instrumentality schoolhouse successful Alameda County, California - which includes the cities of Berkeley and her hometown of Oakland.

During the 1990s, successful the midst of the government's "war connected drugs", Oakland struggled with convulsive crime.

For a inferior prosecutor, the occupation was daunting. But the severity of the cases you had to woody with meant it was considered a apical occupation for a young and ambitious attorney, said Teresa Drenick, who worked with Harris astatine the time.

“It was similar a potboiler of an atmosphere. The magnitude of grief and agony you ingested each time was hard to process. For us, it was intense. The stakes being high, the crimes being truthful serious,” she told the BBC.

"It was adjacent the tallness of the crack-cocaine epidemic. There were pack murders, thoroughfare country murders taking place. There was a batch going connected successful Oakland that enabled you arsenic a authoritative to grip immoderate of the astir superior cases that a authoritative is ever going to handle."

Ms Drenick and Harris were connected the aforesaid proceedings squad together. She admired Harris’s assurance successful beforehand of a jury, and her respect for her workfellow lone grew erstwhile Harris was transferred to a antithetic squad successful the aforesaid courthouse focused connected kid intersexual assault.

"She was very, precise caring of victims of kid abuse. She was capable to talk to them successful a mode that allowed them to unfastened up to her,” she said.

It was astatine this clip that Harris dated Willie Brown, a section governmental kingmaker and talker of the California State Assembly who helped motorboat the careers of immoderate of the state’s different astir salient governmental leaders, including Gavin Newsom, the existent governor, and San Francisco Mayor London Breed.

Brown appointed her to 2 authorities boards and introduced her to immoderate of San Francisco’s highest-profile Democratic donors. The short-lived romance ended by the clip Brown was elected arsenic the city’s politician successful 1995. Three years later, Harris took a occupation astatine the San Francisco territory attorney’s office.

During her narration with Brown, who was 30 years her senior, Harris had begun mingling with immoderate of the city’s governmental heavyweights.

San Francisco's governmental machine, which Harris has described arsenic “a bare-knuckled sport”, has launched the careers of immoderate of the nation’s biggest governmental stalwarts including erstwhile House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the precocious Senator Dianne Feinstein.

Harris forged relationships with some of them, rising alongside contemporaries similar Newsom, arsenic she recovered her feet successful the governmental world.

Her swift emergence done San Francisco’s rough-and-tumble authorities were defined by days successful courtrooms representing victims and nights astatine glitzy governmental galas.

This was besides astir the clip that Harris met 1 of her closest friends – and astir important donors - Laurene Powell Jobs, the widow of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs.

Jobs donated $500 to Harris’s 2003 run for San Francisco territory attorney, which she won, toppling the antheral who had hired her. Twenty years later, the billionaire philanthropist donated astir $1m to the Biden-Harris re-election campaign, according to Fortune Magazine. It’s not known however overmuch she has straight contributed to Harris’s bid for the presidency, but the magnitude is considered substantial.

On the time earlier Easter successful 2004, conscionable 4 months into Kamala Harris’s tenure arsenic the territory lawyer of San Francisco, a pack subordinate brandishing an AK-47 firearm fatally changeable a 29-year aged constabulary serviceman named Isaac Espinoza.

The slaying stunned the city, with galore politicians and salient members of the constabulary calling for the decease penalty.

But Harris, who had made absorption to superior punishment a cardinal portion of her governmental run to go the city’s apical prosecutor, alternatively decided to prosecute a beingness condemnation without parole. She made her determination nationalist conscionable 48 hours aft the murder, without informing the widow first.

“She did not telephone me,” Espinoza told CNN successful 2019. “I don’t recognize wherefore she went connected camera to accidental that without talking to the family. It’s like, you can’t adjacent hold till he’s buried?”

The backlash was swift. Speaking astatine the officer’s funeral, Senator Feinstein demanded his slayer “pay the eventual price”. While walking retired of the religion service, she told reporters that had she known Harris was against the decease penalty, she astir apt wouldn't person endorsed her.

“[T]here tin beryllium nary objection to principle,” Harris later wrote successful an sentiment piece successful the San Francisco Chronicle, defending her decision.

Long-time civilian rights lawyer John Burris, who supported Harris’s determination astatine the time, said helium thought it was “politically was not omniscient for her, but it was a philosophical presumption she took”.

"She was beauteous bold successful her presumption and she did instrumentality a batch of vigor for it,” helium told the BBC. “That was a beauteous progressive stand.”

The incidental could person been the extremity of her governmental ambitions, but Harris, who had grown up with a azygous parent successful the working-class metropolis of Oakland, carried on.

“Is she a governmental animal? Absolutely not. Is she people skilled? Yes,” said Brian Brokaw, who managed Harris’s 2 palmy campaigns for California lawyer wide successful 2010 and 2014. “For her, authorities is the means to the end. She is focused connected the extremity effect and the interaction she tin person connected people’s lives little than the process.”

Harris seemed to sorb immoderate lessons from her archetypal large determination arsenic San Francisco territory attorney. Four years later, she again declined to prosecute the decease punishment aft a melodramatic killing, but this time, she amended understood however her determination would reverberate.

Tony Bologna had been driving successful San Francisco with his 3 sons erstwhile their conveyance was barraged by gunfire. Bologna and 2 of his sons were killed; his 3rd lad was critically injured.

Shortly aft the killing, constabulary arrested Edwin Ramon Umaña, an undocumented subordinate of the MS-13 pack who had evidently mistaken the 49-year aged Bologna for a sworn enemy.

This time, Harris opted to present the hard quality astir her prosecutorial determination to Bologna’s widow Danielle herself, recalls Matt Davis, who was representing Danielle Bologna successful a civilian suit against the metropolis astatine the time.

“It was nary astonishment that Danielle had a precise strong, antagonistic absorption to the news,” Mr Davis told the BBC successful a caller interview. “She made it wide that she was upset, and Kamala listened to her and expressed her sympathies but stayed beauteous firm.”

The gathering near an indelible content connected Davis. He had befriended Harris successful instrumentality schoolhouse successful San Francisco, and erstwhile she had archetypal revealed her plans to tally for D.A., helium remembers reasoning she didn’t person a chance.

But helium says that achy speech made him realise helium had underestimated her.

“That was not an casual happening to do,” Mr Davis said.

Over the span of her instrumentality enforcement career, Harris’s allies sought to overgarment her arsenic a “progressive prosecutor” committed to transgression justness betterment but besides pugnacious connected crime.

It was a good enactment to locomotion successful a wide metropolis successful the country’s largest left-leaning state, and 1 that critics connected some sides of the governmental aisle accidental she did not instrumentality to.

As territory attorney, she adopted a alleged “smart-on-crime” philosophy, which included initiatives to support non-violent offenders retired of situation by steering them into occupation grooming programs and ensuring young offenders remained successful school.

Niki Solis, an lawyer successful the San Francisco nationalist defender’s bureau who worked other Harris successful the aboriginal 2000s, said she had been receptive to her concerns astir however young victims of enactment trafficking were being charged with prostitution, arsenic opposed to being treated arsenic victims.

“I realised that she understood issues that a batch of her predecessors and a batch of [district attorneys] up and down the authorities failed to recognize oregon adjacent acknowledge,” said Ms Solis.

Trump and his allies connected the close person sought to play up this clip successful her career, depicting her arsenic portion of a “San Francisco wide elite”. But connected the near of politics, she has been accused of not being reform-minded enough, with immoderate connected societal media nicknaming her “Kamala the cop”,

But by the clip Harris was elected arsenic California’s lawyer general, successful 2010, her progressive tendencies appeared to person fixed mode to governmental pragmatism.

"She was seeking much of a nationalist profile. She wanted to marque a mark. There was decidedly an anticipation of an absorbing aboriginal to come,” said Gil Duran, who worked for Harris successful the lawyer general’s bureau for a fewer months.

"The lawyer wide - usually a sleepy backwater of an bureau - was present location to a rising star."

On the nationalist stage, Harris began to marque her mark. In 2012, successful the aftermath of the planetary fiscal crisis, Harris threatened to locomotion distant from negotiations connected a fiscal colony betwixt authorities attorneys wide and 5 US banks. California was acceptable to person astir $4 cardinal successful the archetypal deal, and Harris yet secured $18 cardinal for the state.

The Harris run has highlighted this lawsuit connected the run way arsenic much impervious she’s consenting to basal up to almighty interests.

But much caller reporting shows that lone $4.5 cardinal of the colony ended up going towards California homeowners who had been ripped disconnected by lenders.

In moves that angered immoderate liberals, she implemented a schoolhouse truancy programme statewide, which immoderate region prosecutors utilized to apprehension parents. And she defied a Supreme Court bid to trim overcrowding successful the state’s prisons.

She besides reversed her erstwhile presumption connected the decease punishment successful 2014 when, arsenic lawyer general, she appealed a little court’s ruling that recovered it was unconstitutional. Now, the authoritative who erstwhile refused to condemnation convulsive murderers to decease was defending the state’s close to bash conscionable that.

Hadar Aviram, a transgression justness and civilian rights prof who petitioned Harris to permission the determination successful place, was 1 of galore critics of her stance.

“You are not nether immoderate work to support things that are morally unjust,” she told CNN successful 2019 of the episode. “If you genuinely judge that they’re morally unjust and you person an accidental to instrumentality a stand, I deliberation it’s an imperative to bash so.”

Former San Francisco metropolis lawyer Louise Renne, who worked with Harris erstwhile she archetypal near Oakland, said the torrent of disapproval she faced implicit her enactment for the decease punishment was unfair.

“The happening is erstwhile you’re authorities lawyer general, you person to support the law. That’s your obligation,” she told the BBC. “ I don’t respect that arsenic a weakness oregon a valid disapproval astatine all.”

But Harris was selective astir which laws she enforced. In 2004, erstwhile Gavin Newsom, past San Francisco's mayor, decided to let same-sex weddings, successful usurpation of authorities law, Harris ignored it and adjacent helped officiate a fewer of the ceremonies, calling it “one of the astir joyful” moments of her career.

Her agelong grounds arsenic a authoritative would beryllium tricky when, aft being elected to the US Senate successful 2016, Harris decided to tally for the Democratic statesmanlike nomination.

She chose to footwear disconnected her 2020 statesmanlike tally conscionable blocks distant from the Alameda County Courthouse, the aforesaid spot wherever she archetypal uttered the words, “for the people” – which would go portion of her run slogan.

But successful the midst of her campaign, George Floyd, an unarmed achromatic man, was murdered by a constabulary serviceman during an arrest, igniting a nationwide radical reckoning and request for transgression justness reform. Her past defence of the decease penalty, and absorption to situation reform, earned her disapproval from her party’s left-flank.

She dropped retired of the statesmanlike contention earlier the superior contests to take a Democratic contender had adjacent begun.

Now, arsenic Harris campaigns for president against Donald Trump, she is again calling attraction to her prosecutorial bona-fides, but reframed successful a caller governmental atmosphere.

While galore cities, including San Francisco, experimented with progressive constabulary betterment aft Floyd’s murder, a spike successful transgression and homelessness during the pandemic has triggered a nationalist backlash against alleged “soft connected crime” policies. Republicans person besides heavy focused connected governmental messaging astir transgression and nationalist information successful caller years.

Harris’s past arsenic a authoritative is nary longer specified a liability, and successful a contention against the archetypal erstwhile president to beryllium convicted of felony crimes, the communicative aligns with the governmental moment.

Notably, astatine the Democratic National Convention this summer, abolishing the decease punishment was dropped from the enactment platform.

And portion successful 2020, Harris was trying to triumph implicit left-leaning Democrats, she is present explicitly making a transportation for mean Republicans who whitethorn beryllium fed up with Trump. To bash that, she has shifted a fig of her positions - from borderline information to single-payer wellness attraction - to the centre.

This has led to accusations from her opponents that she is simply a flip-flopper.

She’s “a chameleon,” Trump’s moving mate and Ohio Senator JD Vance told CNN successful August. “She pretends to beryllium 1 happening successful beforehand of 1 assemblage and she pretends to beryllium thing antithetic successful beforehand of different audience.”

But Mr Duran, Harris's erstwhile workfellow successful the lawyer general’s office, sees it little arsenic a substance of governmental scrupulousness and much simply a motion of her governmental pragmatism.

"I deliberation she does person condemnation but it’s truly hard to tally a run connected your convictions alone, for the astir part,” helium said. “The Kamala Harris we’re seeing present is precise overmuch canvass and focus-group driven.”

What Kamala Harris truly stands for has been a question that has dogged her passim her vocation - and continues to travel her connected her bid for the Oval Office. But to Mr Brokaw, her erstwhile run manager, she has ever operated connected her ain terms.

“She has carved her ain way and near a full clump of radical down who counted her retired and underestimated her,” helium said.