Questions are swirling over Vice President Harris’s subsequent transfer as she readies to exit the White Home within the wake of her loss to President-elect Trump.
Early polling suggests Democrats wish to see Harris again within the operating for the Oval Workplace in 2028, regardless of her defeat this cycle. However some within the occasion speculate the vp may search one other workplace — for starters, the governor’s mansion in California — or pursue avenues outdoors electoral politics to assist bolster the resistance towards a second Trump time period.
“She still has a long career ahead of her,” mentioned Democratic strategist Kate Maeder. “She’s young for politics in this country, and I think that folks are really excited to see what she does next, because she’s built such a powerful following around her, and I think that that will carry through after the election.”
Election Day was a bruising evening for Democrats. Trump swept all the swing states and made inroads in blue strongholds as many of the nation shifted rightward, and the GOP secured each chambers of Congress to pave approach for a trifecta of energy in Washington subsequent 12 months.
However in her speech conceding the 2024 race to her Republican rival, Harris pressured she is going to by no means surrender on “the fight that fueled” her fast-tracked bid.
The outgoing vp, 60, “still has a fight in her,” Maeder mentioned. “Whether it’s around public policy or it’s fighting the good fight in the private sector, I think it’s left to be seen.”
Harris is amongst a small handful of vice presidents in current historical past who tried for the presidency and misplaced, and every took totally different paths within the aftermath, famous Joel Goldstein, a professor emeritus at Saint Louis College’s regulation faculty and an knowledgeable on the vice presidency. Richard Nixon mounted an unsuccessful bid for California governor earlier than his comeback White Home win in 1968, and Hubert Humphrey returned to the Senate. Al Gore by no means ran for political workplace once more, specializing in environmental activism and incomes the Nobel Peace Prize.
“So there’s a lot of different options available to her,” Goldstein mentioned. “I would think that if she wants to remain active in presidential politics, that that’s certainly something that’s open to her … if that’s the course she wanted.”
A ballot from the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Research and the Los Angeles Occasions this month discovered almost half of California voters can be more likely to help her if she had been to enter the 2026 gubernatorial race.
“If she decided she wanted to run for president in 2028, she would start out as a favorite,” mentioned Jim Kessler, a co-founder of the left-center suppose tank Third Manner. “I don’t think a prohibitive favorite, but definitely someone who would start out on top, would be able to raise money, is known by voters, and who acquitted herself very well in her short campaign against Trump.”
However early lists of potential 2028 contenders are already crowded with Democratic rising stars, together with California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D), Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D), Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro (D) and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.A stacked discipline may make it troublesome for Harris to re-seize the momentum she noticed this 12 months.
“I think she would struggle to win a primary in 2028 and that’s just too long to go between now and then … when you have so many of the people sitting out there who are going to run, likely to run,” mentioned Democratic strategist Fred Hicks.
As a substitute, there is likely to be one other opening for Harris in her house state of California, which is already seen as a bastion of blue-state resistance to the incoming Trump time period.
Newsom is term-limited and ineligible to hunt reelection when his seat is up in 2026, leaving the governor’s mansion up for grabs.
A ballot from the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Research and the Los Angeles Occasions this month discovered almost half of California voters can be more likely to help her if she had been to enter the 2026 gubernatorial race.
Doing so may put her in “a prime position to fight against Trumpism for the latter part of his term,” Hicks mentioned. Newsom’s workplace has mentioned California officers are able to “Trump-proof” state legal guidelines, and the state legal professional normal is equally on alert to withstand controversial Trump insurance policies. However each the governorship and the AG seat might be on the poll in 2026.
As she campaigned for the White Home this 12 months, Harris touted her expertise as a prosecutor in California. She served as San Fransisco district legal professional after which state legal professional normal, making historical past as the primary girl, first African American and first Asian American in each workplaces.She ascended in 2017 to the U.S. Senate, the place she represented the progressive stronghold till she joined the Biden administration.
Working for a four-year time period as governor would possible take Harris out of 2028 competition, however it wouldn’t essentially imply she’d by no means attempt for the Oval Workplace once more, Hicks mentioned, pointing to 2032 and stressing Harris’s younger age relative to Trump and Biden, each greater than 20 years her senior.
However no matter which path Harris picks, “she can and should become the face of the Democratic resistance,” Hicks contended.
Legal professional and Democratic strategist Abou Amara mentioned the California governor’s race, one other presidential run or perhaps a step into the advocacy world all appear to be they’re on the desk for Harris, however “Goal No. 1” is to “really preserve flexibility as she moves forward.”
“Another part of this question is: What does she want her capstone to be on her political career?” Amara mentioned.
And because the mud settles on 2024, consultants additionally anticipate Harris might wade into the Democratic Occasion’s soul-searching efforts and inform her personal story of what occurred within the race. After her 2016 loss to Trump, for instance, Clinton chronicled her bid in a memoir aptly titled “What Happened.”
“I think that will absolutely be part of the next eight to 12 months, to decompress what happened,” Amara mentioned. “I expect her, whether it be through speeches or writing a book, to really lay out her understanding of what happened. Because Democrats are going to squabble back and forth with different theories … but I think it would be important to hear directly from her.”
Consultants and Democratic operatives alike pressured that, only a couple weeks previous Election Day and two months earlier than the White Home adjustments palms, it’s early to see into the crystal ball for Harris’s future. Nonetheless, the consensus prediction is that the outgoing vp will keep within the recreation and stay a change-maker determine for the occasion because it rebuilds post-2024.
“I do think that she deserves some well-earned time to rest and think about her next steps,” Maeder mentioned. “I think that she proved to the Democratic Party and to the nation that she has something to offer when it comes to leadership and the next generation of leadership that the Democratic party is so hungry for. And so what she does next, I think that’s left to be seen.”
