The Truths We Hold: An American Journey

by Kamala Harris

“Alexander, you know how sometimes superheroes are facing a big challenge because a villain is coming for them? What do they do when that happens?” “They fight back,” he whimpered. “That’s right. And they fight back with emotion, because all the best superheroes have big emotions just like you. But they always fight back, right? So that’s what we’re going to do.”

No one really knew what to say or do. Each of us was trying to cope in our own way. I sat down on the couch with Doug and ate an entire family-size bag of classic Doritos. Didn’t share a single chip.

Kamala Harris continues to be relatable and I love that about her.

On July 4, 1992, one of my heroes and inspirations, Thurgood Marshall, gave a speech that deeply resonates today. “We cannot play ostrich,” he said. “Democracy just cannot flourish amid fear. Liberty cannot bloom amid hate. Justice cannot take root amid rage. America must get to work.… We must dissent from the indifference. We must dissent from the apathy. We must dissent from the fear, the hatred, and the mistrust.”

First, my name is pronounced “comma-la,” like the punctuation mark. It means “lotus flower,” which is a symbol of significance in Indian culture. A lotus grows underwater, its flower rising above the surface while its roots are planted firmly in the river bottom.

Those early days were happy and carefree. I loved the outdoors, and I remember that when I was a little girl, my father wanted me to run free. He would turn to my mother and say, “Just let her run, Shyamala.” And then he’d turn to me and say, “Run, Kamala. As fast as you can. Run!” I would take off, the wind in my face, with the feeling that I could do anything. (It’s no wonder I also have many memories of my mother putting Band-Aids on my scraped knees.)

It was a community that was invested in its children, a place where people believed in the most basic tenet of the American Dream: that if you work hard and do right by the world, your kids will be better off than you were. We weren’t rich in financial terms, but the values we internalized provided a different kind of wealth.

My earliest memories of the teachings of the Bible were of a loving God, a God who asked us to “speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves” and to “defend the rights of the poor and needy.” This is where I learned that “faith” is a verb; I believe we must live our faith and show faith in action.

I knew quite well that equal justice was an aspiration. I knew that the force of the law was applied unevenly, sometimes by design. But I also knew that what was wrong with the system didn’t need to be an immutable fact. And I wanted to be part of changing that.

For too long, we’d been told there were only two options: to be either tough on crime or soft on crime—an oversimplification that ignored the realities of public safety. You can want the police to stop crime in your neighborhood and also want them to stop using excessive force. You can want them to hunt down a killer on your streets and also want them to stop using racial profiling. You can believe in the need for consequence and accountability, especially for serious criminals, and also oppose unjust incarceration. I believed it was essential to weave all these varied strands together.

I had prepared, going over the facts of the case a dozen times. I’d practiced the questions I wanted to ask; internalized the precise wording of my legal motions. I’d researched and rehearsed every practice and custom—down to the skirt suit that was de rigueur for female attorneys, back before women were permitted to wear pants in the courtroom. I’d done everything I could. Still, the stakes were so high, it never felt like enough.

“Kamala Harris, for the people.” The reason we have public offices of prosecution in America is that, in our country, a crime against any of us is considered a crime against all of us. Almost by definition, our criminal justice system involves matters in which the powerful have harmed the less powerful, and we do not expect the weaker party to secure justice alone; we make it a collective endeavor. That’s why prosecutors don’t represent the victim; they represent “the people”—society at large.

But what about the one they had already gotten their hands on? How had our system helped her? A conviction was never going to make her whole, nor was it enough to get her out of the cycle of violence in which she was trapped. That reality, and what to do about it, bounced back and forth in my head—sometimes in the back of my mind, sometimes at the front of my skull. But it would be a few years before I could tackle it head-on.

My vision of a progressive prosecutor was someone who used the power of the office with a sense of fairness, perspective, and experience, someone who was clear about the need to hold serious criminals accountable and who understood that the best way to create safe communities was to prevent crime in the first place. To do those things effectively, you also need to run a professional operation.

But more and more, I was coming to feel that “wait and see” wasn’t an option. I thought of James Baldwin, whose words had defined so much of the civil rights struggle. “There is never a time in the future in which we will work out our salvation,” he’d written. “The challenge is in the moment; the time is always now.”

It was a reflection of what I’ve always believed to be true: when it comes to the things that matter most, we have so much more in common than what separates us.

Redemption is an age-old concept rooted in many religions. It is a concept that presupposes that we will all make mistakes, and for some, that mistake will rise to the level of being a crime. Yes, there must be consequences and accountability. But after that debt to society has been paid, is it not the sign of a civil society that we allow people to earn their way back?

I’ve always believed there is no problem too small to fix. I know it may sound trivial, but people were working in offices that hadn’t been painted in years. Not only was it a metaphor for the atrophy that had spread across the department—it was just plain depressing. The staff was demoralized. They felt undervalued, disempowered, and beaten down. Painting the walls was a tangible way to signal that I noticed—and that things were going to change.

But the larger goal was restoring professionalism as the highest value. I knew that there was a direct link between professionalizing the operation and making sure it delivered justice. People needed to be at the top of their game.

Professionalism, as I see it, is in part about what happens inside an office. But it’s also about how people carry themselves outside the office. When I trained younger lawyers, I’d say, “Let’s be clear. You represent the people. So I expect you to get to know exactly who the people are.” I’d tell my team to learn about the communities where they didn’t live, to follow neighborhood news, to go to local festivals and community forums. “For the people” means for them. All of them.

You don’t add the intractable problems to the list because they are new, but because they are big, because people have been fighting against them for dozens—maybe even hundreds—of years, and that duty is now yours. What matters is how well you run the portion of the race that is yours.

But she wasn’t fixated on that distant dream; she focused on the work right in front of her. The work that would move us closer, day by day, year by year, until we crossed the finish line. “Focus on what’s in front of you and the rest will follow,” she would say.

That is the spirit we need to bring to building a more perfect union: recognition that we are part of a longer story, and we are responsible for how our chapter gets written. In the battle to build a smarter, fairer, more effective criminal justice system, there is an enormous amount of work to do. We know what the problems are. So let’s roll up our sleeves and start fixing them.

We also need to stop treating drug addiction like a public safety crisis instead of what it is: a public health crisis.

But I also know this: it is a false choice to suggest that you must either be for the police or for police accountability. I am for both. Most people I know are for both. Let’s speak some truth about that, too.

“Look, we’re a guest at someone else’s party and we don’t have our own car,” I said. “We need our own ride so that when we’re ready to leave, we can leave.”

Tough decisions are tough precisely because the outcome isn’t clear. But your gut will tell you if you’re on the right track. And you’ll know what decision to make.

About ten seconds later, my assistant popped her head into my office. “Mr. Dimon is on the line.” I took off my earrings (the Oakland in me) and picked up the receiver.

In order to bring a case in court, you are required to have standing, which means, among other things, that you have suffered or might suffer an actual injury. (In more colloquial terms, I think of it as my New Jersey–raised husband might explain it: you have to be able to provide a concrete answer to the question “Whatsittoya?”)

Studies show that the end of third grade is a critical milestone for students. Up until that point, the curriculum focuses on teaching students to learn to read. In fourth grade, there’s a shift, and students transition to reading in order to learn. If students can’t read, they can’t learn, and they fall further behind, month after month and year after year—which forces them onto a nearly inescapable path to poverty. The door of opportunity closes on them when they’re barely four feet tall. I believe it is tantamount to a crime when a child goes without an education.

Still, I was willing to be the bad guy if it meant highlighting an issue that otherwise would have received too little attention. Political capital doesn’t gain interest. You have to spend it to make a difference.

Stereotypes held that a child becomes a chronically truant student because his or her parents don’t care about the child’s future. But the truth is different. The truth is that the vast majority of parents have a natural desire to parent their children well. They want to be good fathers and mothers. They just may not have the skills or the resources they need.

As a single, professional woman in my forties, and very much in the public eye, dating wasn’t easy. I knew that if I brought a man with me to an event, people would immediately start to speculate about our relationship. I also knew that single women in politics are viewed differently than single men. We don’t get the same latitude when it comes to our social lives. I had no interest in inviting that kind of scrutiny unless I was close to sure I’d found “the One”—which meant that for years, I kept my personal life compartmentalized from my career.

I got up early that morning. I had an early meeting. And as I was driving to work, I couldn’t get you off my mind. And I kept saying to myself, “It’s eight thirty a.m., it’s way too early to call her. That would be ridiculous. Don’t be that guy. Just don’t. Don’t call her. Don’t do it.” And then, “Oh no, I just rang her number,” and, “Oh no, it’s ringing.

This is just so wholesome. These two awkward, badass people finding each other. I love it.

The voicemail, which I still have saved to this day, was long and a little rambling. He sounded like a nice guy, though, and I was intrigued to learn more. Doug, on the other hand, was pretty sure that he had ruined his chances. The way he tells it, he thought his voicemail had been disastrous and that he’d likely never hear from me again. He had to restrain himself from calling again and leaving another long-winded message trying to explain away the first one.

AND SHE SAVED HIS AWKARD VOICEMAIL

Attending a speech about the ills of truancy isn’t exactly what most people think of as a romantic date, but the event was Doug’s coming out—the first time I’d invited him to join me at a professional gathering. Hence the whispering and pointing among my team, who had heard rumors of his existence but hadn’t seen him with their own eyes. They would later refer to that era as A.D.—“After Doug.” They loved how much he made me laugh. I did, too.

We waited until about two months after we’d met, although in my memory it feels like we’d been together for a long time—maybe because the buildup was so great, or because, by the time the big day finally arrived, I felt like I’d loved Doug for years.

was beating myself up for trying to do too much, even as I worried that I wasn’t doing quite enough, and all of this stress coalesced in the form of a search for my black pants.

What mattered to me was the work. And when it came to the work that mattered most, I wasn’t finished yet. Later that evening, I called Holder to let him know. Then Doug and I curled up on the couch with the kids and a big bowl of popcorn and, for the second time, watched Iron Man 2.

“It is the very nature of this fight for civil rights and justice and equality that whatever gains we make, they will not be permanent. So we must be vigilant,” I said. “Understanding that, do not despair. Do not be overwhelmed. Do not throw up our hands when it is time to roll up our sleeves and fight for who we are.”

The words of one prominent, powerful bully have been mimicked and adopted as the rallying cry of bullies everywhere.

Emma Lazarus’s words—“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free”—speak to our true character: a generous country that respects and embraces those who have made the difficult journey to our shores, often fleeing harm; that sees our quintessentially optimistic, can-do spirit in those who aspire to make the American Dream their own. How could I vote to build what would be little more than a monument, designed to send the cold, hard message “KEEP OUT”?

The immigration debate is so often defined by false choices. I remember a town hall I held in Sacramento, where a group of the president’s supporters showed up. One man said he thought I cared more about undocumented immigrants than I cared about the American people. It was a false choice. I care deeply about them both. Similarly, the budget debate was offering a false choice: fund the government or oppose the wall. I believed we could do both.

A society is judged by the way it treats its children—and history will judge us harshly for this. Most Americans know that already. Most Americans are appalled and ashamed. We are better than this. And we must make right the wrongs that this administration has committed in our name.

And though I miss her every day, I carry her with me wherever I go. I think of her all the time. Sometimes I look up and talk to her. I love her so much. And there is no title or honor on earth I’ll treasure more than to say I am Shyamala Gopalan Harris’s daughter. That is the truth I hold dearest of all.

She saw the dignity in the work that society requires to function. She believed that everyone deserves respect for the work they do, and that hard effort should be rewarded and honored.

“So often we overlook the work and the significance of those who are not in professional jobs, of those who are not in the so-called big jobs,” he said. “But let me say to you tonight, that whenever you are engaged in work that serves humanity and is for the building of humanity, it has dignity and it has worth.”

The American people have not given up on the American Dream. I know this to be true. But when you can’t sleep at night, how can you dream?

“Like many Americans, I understand the urgency that drove the decision to resort to so-called enhanced interrogation methods after our country was attacked,” McCain wrote. “I know that those who used enhanced interrogation methods and those who approved them wanted to protect Americans from harm. I appreciate their dilemma and the strain of their duty. But as I have argued many times, the methods we employ to keep our nation safe must be as right and just as the values we aspire to live up to and promote in the world.

When you speak truth, people won’t always walk away feeling good—and sometimes you won’t feel so great about the reaction you receive. But at least all parties will walk away knowing it was an honest conversation. That is not to say that all truth is uncomfortable, or that the intention is to cause discomfort. Many truths are incredibly hopeful. I am simply saying that the job of an elected official is not to sing a lullaby and soothe the country into a sense of complacency. The job is to speak truth, even in a moment that does not welcome or invite its utterance.

When you show people the math, you give them the tools to decide whether they agree with the solution. And even if they don’t agree with everything, they may find that they agree with you most of the way—a kind of policy-making “partial credit” that can form the basis for constructive collaboration.