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How Kamala Harris found her groove. And why being vice president is still tough

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How Kamala Harris found her groove. And why being vice president is still tough

“Proud,” Kamala Harris said, elongating the word and stretching its vowels. “PROUD!”

Donald Trump expressed his great delight at choosing three of the Supreme Court justices who overturned the constitutional right to abortion and now the vice president was using his own word — proud — to whip up a labor hall packed with jeering, cheering Nevada Democrats.

“Proud,” she said. “Proud for taking the freedom of choice from millions of women and people in America.”

With that, her voice rose as though she could scarcely believe the statement issuing from her lips.

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“He openly talks about his admiration for dictators,” Harris continued in the same tone of wonderment, as some in the audience murmured their disapproval. “Dictators jail journalists. Dictators suspend elections.”

“Dictators.” She emphasized each word. “Take. Your. Rights.”

After a history-making ascent to the vice presidency and a humbling descent into mockery and disdain following her rocky start, Harris finally seems to have found her footing in a role to which she is accustomed and adept: prosecuting attorney.

She’s become a top fundraiser for Democrats, an emissary to groups that are lukewarm toward President Biden — in particular Black and younger voters — and emerged as the administration’s most forceful voice on abortion, women’s health and, as Harris frames it, the threat Trump poses to freedom and individual choice.

On a recent three-day swing through California and Nevada, she highlighted the abortion issue and urged Democrats to vote early ahead of Tuesday’s Nevada primary.

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“Do you believe in freedom?” the vice president hollered, and a crowd of 300 or so partisans inside the brightly lighted union hall screamed in affirmation. “Do you believe in democracy?”

“Are we ready to fight for it? Because when we fight” — and here they joined Harris in a thundering chorus — “we win!”

Columnist Mark Z. Barabak joins candidates for various offices as they hit the campaign trail in this momentous election year.

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Her higher profile — as cheerleader, prosecutor, pugilist — is a reset of sorts after Harris’ many early missteps and a series of assignments, among them immigration reform and border control, that seemed destined to fail.

Her purpose, and utility, changed when the Supreme Court issued its abortion decision in the Dobbs case in June 2022, overturning Roe vs. Wade.

Even as her approval ratings continue to languish, those in the vice president’s orbit say she has grown more assured in a capacity that better suits her skills as a former district attorney and California attorney general.

The abortion issue “taps into her policy background, her political values, her legal training and experience,” said Jamal Simmons, who served a year as Harris’ communications director, ending in January 2023. “The issue is a comfort zone for her and since Dobbs she has done other things with greater confidence and dexterity.”

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The travels of the vice president are intended to be as frictionless as possible.

A blocks-long motorcade glides along freeways closed to traffic and knifes through city streets cleared specially for her path. Invited guests cheer Harris’ airport arrival and departure, and reporters are kept at bay by an aggressive squadron of Secret Service agents.

Still, outside events have a way of piercing the bubble.

So the vice president appeared ready when protesters popped up in San José, where Harris appeared as part of her national “Fight for Reproductive Freedoms” tour. Several hundred backers filled a large auditorium at the adobe-style Mexican Heritage Plaza, as Harris fielded questions gently lofted by the actress Sophia Bush.

Demonstrators unfurled banners reading “Free Palestine” and “Ceasefire Now.” They repeatedly interrupted Harris, loudly condemning the Biden administration’s support for Israel in its war with Hamas.

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“You are complicit in genocide,” a young woman hollered from the fourth row before being escorted from the auditorium as the crowd chanted, “MVP!” “MVP!” — short for Madam Vice President.

Harris looked on, expressionless. Protest is a fundamental part of democracy, she said evenly. Everyone wants to see the conflict in the Middle East come to an end.

A second outburst followed. Moments later a third. “So,” Harris began, then paused at length. “There are a lot of big issues impacting our world right now. Which evoke rightly very, very strong emotions and fears and anger and tears.

“The topic for today,” she went on, assuming the tone of an admonishing schoolteacher, “is the topic of what has happened in our country after the Dobbs decision … and so I’m going to get back to the issue. Because it’s an important one and we should not be distracted.”

By the fourth interruption, Harris merely paused and waited as a demonstrator in the balcony was led away. Supporters chanted, “Four more years!” She then picked up precisely where she’d left off mid-sentence, making her case against Trump and the conservative Supreme Court majority, as though nothing had happened at all.

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Equanimity could well be part of the job description.

As the first female, Black and Asian American vice president, Harris has drawn extraordinary scrutiny and with it an outsized presumption of what she can plausibly achieve.

The vice presidency is, and always has been, inherently limiting — there is no greater trespass than overstepping or overshadowing the president — and that can’t help but diminish those holding the job, whatever their place in history.

Even fans of Harris have a hard time comprehending her status and appreciating that gap between expectation and reality.

Mia Casey, the mayor of Hollister, rose before dawn and drove an hour and 15 minutes to see Harris in San José.

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“I liked her when she was running with Biden, but I haven’t seen a lot of her,” Casey said from her perch, 10 rows back and left of center stage. “I expected to see her more visible out there, doing some more meaty things in D.C.”

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If Harris’ main mission is working to reelect Biden (and herself) in November, another aspect is convincing Casey and others that she’s far more than a bit player in the Biden administration — or Biden-Harris administration, as the vice president prefers.

At her Las Vegas rally, Harris delivered a joined-at-the-hip accounting of the last three years.

“President Biden and I canceled more than $138 billion” in student loans, she said. “President Biden and I took on Big Pharma” to cap the price of insulin. “President Biden and I” boosted loans to hundreds of small businesses.

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Still, it’s often her lot to be eclipsed, or treated as a mere afterthought.

Introducing Harris, Nevada Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto recalled the depths of the pandemic lockdown, when the Las Vegas Strip went dark and unemployment in the metropolitan area soared past 30%.

“It was one president who came and worked with us to ensure that we could turn our economy around and come out of that horrific time,” Cortez Masto said. She paused for dramatic effect. “And that was President Biden.”

“And,” she hastened, “Vice President Harris.”

It was a non sequitur, but at least the senator recognized the guest of honor.

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Harris loves to cook, so a pre-rally stop at the Chef Jeff Project in North Las Vegas offered a happy convergence of pleasure and politics.

The program was started by Jeff Henderson, an ex-convict turned celebrity chef, who mentors at-risk youth for careers in the culinary arts. His industrial-size kitchen in a scruffy strip mall serves as a kind of shrine to second chances, so the cramped quarters offered a perfect backdrop for Harris’ event. Its theme: the power of redemption.

Standing before a small portable lectern and speaking before a brace of cameras, the vice president announced a change in federal policy that would make it easier for once-incarcerated people to obtain Small Business Administration loans.

Yes, she said over the whir of an ice machine, there must be accountability, especially for criminal wrongdoing. “But is it not the sign of a civil society to allow people the ability to come back and earn their way back?”

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Harris swept through the work area, past tall shelves piled high with plates and pans, stopping where Kam Winslow was stirring a giant bowl of jambalaya. “Let’s talk about your process,” she said. “Tell me how you did it.”

As Winslow explained — dicing chicken, browning andouille sausage, saving the shrimp for last, so it doesn’t overcook — Harris punctuated his narration with a series of small interjections. “Yes.” “Uh-huh.” “Delicious.”

“You know what I love about cooking, is the process,” Harris told him. “It’s about having patience and knowing that it’s going to take steps, right? Like it’s just not going to be easy to do.”

“Same with life,” Winslow said.

“Yes, that’s exactly right,” agreed the vice president, who’s learned a few things in recent years about trial and error, mistakes and do-overs. “That’s exactly right.”

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Video: Walz Drops Re-Election Bid as Minnesota Fraud Scandal Grows

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Video: Walz Drops Re-Election Bid as Minnesota Fraud Scandal Grows

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Walz Drops Re-Election Bid as Minnesota Fraud Scandal Grows

Governor Tim Walz of Minnesota abandoned his re-election bid to focus on handling a scandal over fraud in social service programs that grew under his administration.

“I’ve decided to step out of this race, and I’ll let others worry about the election while I focus on the work that’s in front of me for the next year.” “All right, so this is Quality Learing Center — meant to say Quality ‘Learning’ Center.” “Right now we have around 56 kids enrolled. If the children are not here, we mark absence.”

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Governor Tim Walz of Minnesota abandoned his re-election bid to focus on handling a scandal over fraud in social service programs that grew under his administration.

By Shawn Paik

January 6, 2026

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Pelosi heir-apparent calls Trump’s Venezuela move a ‘lawless coup,’ urges impeachment, slams Netanyahu

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Pelosi heir-apparent calls Trump’s Venezuela move a ‘lawless coup,’ urges impeachment, slams Netanyahu

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A San Francisco Democrat demanded the impeachment of President Donald Trump, accusing him of carrying out a “coup” against Venezuelan strongman Nicolás Maduro.

California state Sen. Scott Wiener, seen as the likely congressional successor to Rep. Nancy Pelosi, also took a swipe at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Wiener has frequently drawn national attention for his progressive positions, including his legislation signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom designating California as a “refuge” for transgender children and remarks at a San Francisco Pride Month event referring to California children as “our kids.”

In a lengthy public statement following the Trump administration’s arrest and extradition of Maduro to New York, Wiener said the move shows the president only cares about “enriching his public donors” and “cares nothing for the human or economic cost of conquering another country.”

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KAMALA HARRIS BLASTS TRUMP ADMINISTRATION’S CAPTURE OF VENEZUELA’S MADURO AS ‘UNLAWFUL AND UNWISE’

California State Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, speaks at a rally. (John Sciulli/Getty Images)

“This lawless coup is an invitation for China to invade Taiwan, for Russia to escalate its conquest in Ukraine, and for Netanyahu to expand the destruction of Gaza and annex the West Bank,” said Wiener, who originally hails from South Jersey.

He suggested that the Maduro operation was meant to distract from purportedly slumping poll numbers, the release of Jeffrey Epstein-related documents, and to essentially seize another country’s oil reserves.

“Trump is a total failure,” Wiener said. “By engaging in this reckless act, Trump is also making the entire world less safe … Trump is making clear yet again that, under this regime, there are no rules, there are no laws, there are no norms – there is only whatever Trump thinks is best for himself and his cronies at a given moment in time.”

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GREENE HITS TRUMP OVER VENEZUELA STRIKES, ARGUES ACTION ‘DOESN’T SERVE THE AMERICAN PEOPLE’

In response, the White House said the administration’s actions against Maduro were “lawfully executed” and included a federal arrest warrant.”

“While Democrats take twisted stands in support of indicted drug smugglers, President Trump will always stand with victims and families who can finally receive closure thanks to this historic action,” White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said.

Supporters of the operation have pushed back on claims of “regime change” – an accusation Wiener also made – pointing to actions by Maduro-aligned courts that barred top opposition leader María Corina Machado from running, even as publicly reported results indicated her proxy, Edmundo González Urrutia, won the vote.

“Trump’s illegal invasion of Venezuela isn’t about drugs, and it isn’t about helping the people of Venezuela or restoring Venezuelan democracy,” Wiener added. “Yes, Maduro is awful, but that’s not what the invasion is about. It’s all about oil and Trump’s collapsing support at home.”

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EX-ESPN STAR KEITH OLBERMANN CALLS FOR IMPEACHMENT OF TRUMP OVER VENEZUELA STRIKES THAT CAPTURED MADURO

Around the country, a handful of other Democrats referenced impeachment or impeachable offenses, but did not go as far as Wiener in demanding such proceedings.

Rep. April McClain-Delaney, D-Md., who represents otherwise conservative “Mountain Maryland” in the state’s panhandle, said Monday that Democrats should “imminently consider impeachment proceedings,” according to TIME.

McClain-Delaney said Trump acted without constitutionally-prescribed congressional authorization and wrongly voiced “intention to ‘run’ the country.”

SCHUMER BLASTED TRUMP FOR FAILING TO OUST MADURO — NOW WARNS ARREST COULD LEAD TO ‘ENDLESS WAR’

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One frequent Trump foil, Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., cited in a statement that she has called for Trump’s impeachment in the past; blaming Republicans for letting the president “escape accountability.”

“Today, many Democrats have understandably questioned whether impeachment is possible again under the current political reality. I am reconsidering that view,” Waters said. 

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“What we are witnessing is an unprecedented escalation of an unlawful invasion, the detention of foreign leaders, and a president openly asserting power far beyond what the Constitution allows,” she said, while appearing to agree with Trump that Maduro was involved in drug trafficking and “collaborat[ion] with… terrorists.”

Wiener’s upcoming primary is considered the deciding election in the D+36 district, while a handful of other lesser-known candidates have reportedly either filed FEC paperwork or declared their candidacy, including San Francisco Councilwoman Connie Chan.

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California Congressman Doug LaMalfa dies, further narrowing GOP margin in Congress

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California Congressman Doug LaMalfa dies, further narrowing GOP margin in Congress

California Rep. Doug LaMalfa (R-Richvale) has died, GOP leadership and President Trump confirmed Tuesday morning.

“Jacquie and I are devastated about the sudden loss of our friend, Congressman Doug LaMalfa. Doug was a loving father and husband, and staunch advocate for his constituents and rural America,” said Rep. Tom Emmer (R-Minn.), the House majority whip, in a post on X. “Our prayers are with Doug’s wife, Jill, and their children.”

LaMalfa, 65, was a fourth-generation rice farmer from Oroville and staunch Trump supporter who had represented his Northern California district for the past 12 years. His seat was one of several that was in jeopardy under the state’s redrawn districts approved by voters with Proposition 50.

Emergency personnel responded to a 911 call from LaMalfa’s residence at 6:50 p.m. Monday, according to the Butte County Sheriff’s Office. The congressman was taken to the Enloe Medical Center in Chico, where he died while undergoing emergency surgery, authorities said.

An autopsy to determine the cause of death is planned, according to the sheriff’s office.

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LaMalfa’s district — which stretches from the northern outskirts of Sacramento, through Redding at the northern end of the Central Valley and Alturas in the state’s northeast corner — is largely rural, and constituents have long said they felt underrepresented in liberal California.

LaMalfa put much of his focus on boosting federal water supplies to farmers, and seeking to reduce environmental restrictions on logging and extraction of other natural resources.

One LaMalfa’s final acts in the U.S. House was to successfully push for the reauthorization of the Secure Rural Schools Act, a long-standing financial aid program for schools surrounded by untaxed federal forest land, whose budgets could not depend upon property taxes, as most public schools do. Despite broad bipartisan support, Congress let it lapse in 2023.

In an interview with The Times as he was walking onto the House floor in mid-December, LaMalfa said he was frustrated with Congress’s inability to pass even a popular bill like that reauthorization.

The Secure Rural Schools Act, he said, was a victim of a Congress in which “it’s still an eternal fight over anything fiscal.” It is “annoying,” LaMalfa said, “how hard it is to get basic things done around here.”

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In a statement posted on X, California Democratic Sen. Adam Schiff said he considered LaMalfa “a friend and partner” and that the congressman was “deeply committed to his community and constituents, working to make life better for those he represented.”

“Doug’s life was one of great service and he will be deeply missed,” Schiff wrote.

Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom in a statement called LaMalfa a “devoted public servant who deeply loved his country, his state, and the communities he represented.”

“While we often approached issues from different perspectives, he fought every day for the people of California with conviction and care,” Newsom said.

Flags at the California State Capitol in Sacramento will be flown at half-staff in honor of the congressman, according to the governor.

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Before his death, LaMalfa was facing a difficult reelection bid to hold his seat. After voters approved Proposition 50 in November — aimed at giving California Democrats more seats in Congress — LaMalfa was drawn into a new district that heavily favored his likely opponent, State Sen. Mike McGuire, a Democrat who represents the state’s northwest coast.

LaMalfa’s death puts the Republican majority in Congress in further jeopardy, with a margin of just two votes to secure passage of any bill along party lines after the resignation of Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene on Monday evening.

Adding to the party’s troubles, Rep. Jim Baird, a Republican from Indiana, was hospitalized on Tuesday for a car crash described by the White House as serious. While Baird is said to be stable, the Republican House speaker, Mike Johnson from Louisiana, will not be able to rely on his attendance. And he has one additional caucus member – Thomas Massie of Kentucky – who has made a habit of voting against the president, bringing their margin for error down effectively to zero.

President Trump, addressing a gathering of GOP House members at the Kennedy Center, addressed the news at the start of his remarks, expressing “tremendous sorrow at the loss of a great member” and stating his speech would be made in LaMalfa’s honor.

“He was the leader of the Western caucus – a fierce champion on California water issues. He was great on water. ‘Release the water!’ he’d scream out. And a true defender of American children.”

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“You know, he voted with me 100% of the time,” Trump added.

A native of Oroville, LaMalfa attended Butte College and then earned an ag-business degree from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. He served in the California Assembly from 2002 to 2008 and the California State Senate from 2010 to 2012. Staunchly conservative, he was an early supporter of Proposition 209, which ended affirmative action in California, and he also pushed for passage of the Protection of Marriage Act, Proposition 22, which banned same-sex marriage in California.

While representing California’s 1st District, LaMalfa focused largely on issues affecting rural California and other western states. In 2025, Congressman he was elected as Chairman of the Congressional Western Caucus, which focuses on legislation affected rural areas.

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