Kamala Harris meets with them in the Hamptons this weekend and highlights her possible intention of taking up Clinton’s role and running for the office in 2020.
At the Bridgehampton event, Harris was seen getting in touch with some of the top donors of the Clinton campaigned, and highlighted that she is perhaps thinking of something much bigger than running for the Senate. As one of the Clinton donor’s state, “She’s running for president. Take it to the bank.” “She’s absolutely going to run,” another indicated.
Ever since Clinton’s defeat, her donors had been looking for a prospect to fill in her shoes and hopefully help put the failing party together. However, whether Harris, a former prosecutor-turned-California attorney general could prove to be the “new and different” that the Democrats need at this time still remains an unanswered.
“There’s a big hunger out there for somebody new and different,” pointed out Bill Carrick, a Democratic consultant who also served as an adviser to former Rep. Loretta Sanchez (D-Calif.)
“People are looking for champions. … She’s in that category. There are people who might not know her real well but want to like her. What little they know, they like,” added Carrick.
Harris gained significant attention as President Trump’s aggressive critic as she urged the importance of looking into Trump’s connection with Russia and fight with “courage not courtesy.”
However, Harris’s courage when it comes to holding her donors accountable for their wrongdoings remains in question. The Observer notes that Harris has a history showing her leniency when it comes to investigating her donors. “The nomination of Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin provoked criticisms over his tenure as CEO of OneWest Bank. In 2013, California prosecutors claimed to have discovered over 1,000 foreclosure law violations, but the California Attorney General’s office failed to file any action against the bank. At the time, Kamala Harris was California’s attorney general. Many questioned why Harris didn’t take any action given the evidence her office uncovered.”
Harris’s response to this was that “We went and we followed the facts and the evidence, and it’s a decision my office made,” Harris told The Hill. “We pursued it just like any other case. We go and we take a case wherever the facts lead us.” This explanation was not sufficient to backup as to why her office didn’t looking into filing criminal charges against donors of her very own campaign.
It seems every evident that Harris has big plans, as she met with many important figures in Clinton’s inner circle, including “Clinton’s 2008 Campaign National Finance co-Chair Michael Kempner, donors Dennis Mehiel and Steven Gambrel, and Democratic National Committeeman Robert Zimmerman. Harris also attended a separate luncheon hosted by one of Clinton’s top lobbyist bundlers, Liz Robbins,” as indicated by the Observer. This could be a major step by Harris to begin securing donations.