Harris debates her future: A run for California governor that would take 2028 off the table
By Edward-Isaac Dovere, CNN
Delusional, All of Them
Sun December 15, 2024
Top aides and people close to Kamala Harris have divided over whether she should head home to run for California governor in 2026— and it all comes down to whether they believe she could win the Democratic nomination for president in an expected competitive primary in 2028.
Some believe a repeat run, after quickly improving her reputationand raising more than $1 billion over her surprise 100-day race, should be hers for the taking. Others worry that in a longer campaign, against some of the other major Democratic contenders who already sat out 2024 in deference first to Joe Biden and then to her, Harris might fizzle out and follow her loss to Donald Trump with the humiliation of being rejected by her own party.
The governor’s race, meanwhile, looks like a lay-up: Harris was elected statewide three times and served 10 years combined as state attorney general and US senator, and when asked by CNN, several major candidates made clear either directly or through aides that they would likely step aside if she got in.
In CNN’s conversation with over a dozen current and former Harris advisers and other top California Democratic players, the only consensus around the vice president is that she likely can’t do both, since that would essentially require launching a presidential campaign soon after being sworn in as governor.
Getting into the governor’s race, top Harris advisers believe, would require making her intentions clear at the latest by the summer of 2025. That means Harris will need to decide very soon after Trump’s inauguration if she will quickly give up on her dream of being president – which she feels got short shrift from the circumstances of this year – and instead go for a job that, while one of the most powerful in American politics, would clearly be a fallback.
Harris would have to think of running for governor as “more of a capstone than a stepping stone,” said one person who has advised her in the past. “If you’re thinking of running for president in 2028, the worst thing you can do is run for governor in 2026.”
Another person close to Harris told CNN that the gamble of skipping the governor’s race is worth the potential payoff.
“Running for governor would be a step down, and it would interfere with her ability to run for president again,” the person said. “I don’t know if she’s going to run for president again, but a shot at running for president again is worth giving up running for governor.”
‘Not going quietly into the night’
Several people who have spoken with the vice president directly told CNN that she remains undecided herself, unsure how to channel feelings she has, for now, worked into stock lines like “you haven’t seen the last of me,” and “I’m not going quietly into the night” repeated to supporters who ask her what’s next.
More than one person has noticed she has not shut down the conversation when the topic of running for governor has come up.
In the meantime, Harris has kept a noticeably low profile, appearing at just a handful of public events since her concession speech, while her thank-you phone calls with donors and other supporters have often gone long, with tears on both ends, according to people familiar with the calls. She did host many staff from her office and from her campaign for a holiday party at the Naval Observatory this past Wednesday, and a smaller group of close friends and supporters for a black tie dinner there on Friday night.
(They gotta be blowing smoke up her assShe's been publicly drunk three times since losing)
https://www.cnn.com/2024/12/15/politics/kamala-harris-future-2028-california-governor/index.html