Who is part of Kamala Harris’ ‘large, complicated’ family?

Vice President Kamala Harris has had to quickly reintroduce herself to US voters, who are now viewing her as a potential commander-in-chief, rather than as Joe Biden’s vice-president.

And at the most important moment of Ms Harris’s career to date — the Democratic convention in Chicago — they will also meet the family members who will be by her side, as well as those who helped her achieve that success.

Unlike her rival Donald Trump, Ms Harris has only been married once and is a stepmother. Here’s a look at her large, modern family.

Ms Harris met her current husband, entertainment lawyer Doug Emhoff, in Los Angeles in 2013, when she was serving as California attorney general. They married the following year. Since then, Mr Emhoff, 59, has been by his wife’s side as she rose through the ranks of US politics.

In 2020, when Ms. Harris made history as the first Black and South Asian woman to become vice president, Mr. Emhoff also made history as the first husband of a U.S. president or vice president, as well as the first Jewish spouse of a vice president.

He left his law firm that year to focus full-time on his role as “second gentleman,” a position that pulled him out of relative obscurity. He is now known as a passionate champion of Democratic causes and Ms. Harris’s most loyal surrogate on the campaign trail.

The vice president’s marriage made her a stepmother to Cole and Ella, Emhoff’s two children with his first wife, Kerstin Emhoff.

Harris has often said that of her many titles, “Momala” — a term coined by Cole and Ella — is the most important. That sentiment seems to go both ways — Cole and Ella, now 30 and 25, respectively, have been staunch supporters of Harris.

“The greatest stepmother in the world,” was Ella’s introduction at the 2020 Democratic convention. “She was a rock, not just for our dad, but for three generations of our big, blended family.”

Cole, a 2017 graduate of Colorado College, followed his father into the entertainment industry with jobs at talent agency WME and then Brad Pitt’s production company Plan B.

Ella, a graduate of Parsons School of Design in New York City, signed with IMG Models in 2021 and has walked for high-end fashion brands like Balenciaga and Proenza Schouler. She is also an artist and prolific knitter, launching her knitting brand and club Soft Hands in 2021.

Cole and Ella’s mother, Kerstin, has been – perhaps surprisingly – vocal and positive about Harris. Kerstin recently came to Harris’ defense when JD Vance’s “bare cat” comments resurfaced.

“For over 10 years, since Cole and Ella were teenagers, Kamala has been a co-parent to Doug and me,” Kerstin said in a statement to CNN. “She is loving, nurturing, fiercely protective and always present. I love our new family and am grateful to have her in it.”

Kerstin, founder and CEO of production company Prettybird, even contributed her creative expertise and connections to the 2020 campaign.

“They asked me, ‘What does the ex-wife want to do?'” Kerstin told Marie Claire in 2020.

Kamala Harris is known to be very close to her only sibling and younger sister, Maya Harris. After her parents divorced, the two girls were primarily raised by their mother, Shyamala Gopalan, in Berkeley, California.

Like her sister, Maya pursued a career in law and graduated from Stanford University Law School in 1992. She worked as a litigator and taught law before joining the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Northern California, where she became executive director in 2006.

Maya, 57, eventually moved into politics, serving as a senior policy adviser to Hillary Clinton during her 2016 presidential campaign. She then served as campaign chair for her sister’s 2020 Democratic candidacy, before becoming a surrogate for the Biden-Harris ticket.

Maya’s only child, Meena, followed in the Harris family tradition by graduating from law school. Meena advised her “Auntie” Kamala in the early stages of her political career, as she moved through positions at elite Silicon Valley companies like Uber, Facebook, and Slack.

In 2017, the mother of two launched Phenomenal, a media and business company focused on projects led by women and other minorities.

But Meena’s career is still tied to her aunt’s in some way.

In June 2020, she published a children’s book about her aunt and mother called “Kamala and Maya’s Big Idea.” And after Mr. Biden picked Ms. Harris as his running mate, Phenomenal began selling “Vice President Aunty” sweatshirts.

Maya’s husband, Meena’s stepfather, Tony West is another talented member of the Harris clan and is also a lawyer.

A graduate of Stanford Law (where he met Maya and her toddler daughter), Mr. West has worked at senior levels in the private and public sectors. He was deputy attorney general under President Barack Obama and served as general counsel for PepsiCo.

Mr. West is currently Uber’s chief legal officer, but he has also emerged as a key adviser to his sister-in-law’s campaign.

Uber said he will take a leave of absence this month to devote himself to Team Harris.

“I have always believed that family comes first,” Mr. West said in a statement. “Therefore, I have decided to devote my full time to supporting my family and my sister-in-law during the campaign.”

Although Dr. Shyamala Gopalan died before she could see her daughter run for president, Kamala and Maya Harris say their scientist mother inspired both of their careers.

“My mom was the first person to tell me that my thoughts and experiences matter,” Harris wrote on Facebook in 2022. “My mom used to tell me, ‘Kamala, you may be the first to do a lot of things. Make sure you’re not the last.’”

Gopalan, who died in 2009, moved to the United States from India when she was 19 to study science and later became a breast cancer researcher.

Her work in the civil rights movement led her to meet her future husband: economist and Jamaican immigrant Donald Harris. Harris has credited her mother with raising both her and Maya, and her current relationship with her father remains unclear.