Kamala Harris: What her California years reveal

This article originally appeared in CalMatters, a nonprofit, nonpartisan media venture explaining California policies and politics. After nearly a decade in Alameda County and a short stint as a deputy district attorney in San Francisco, in 2000, Harris joined the San Francisco city attorney’s office under Louise Renne. She knew it was an important one and it should be celebrated.” Harris’ focus on the victims of abuse and exploitation continued after she was elected as San Francisco’s District Attorney. In 2014, when a federal court judge ruled that California’s administration of the death penalty was unconstitutional, Harris appealed the decision as state attorney general, arguing that it was “not supported by the law.” Harris later said that she was obligated to defend capital punishment as the legal representative of the state. Prosecutorial overreach controversies Both as district attorney and as state attorney general, Harris led offices that criminal justice advocates say was overly aggressive in pursuing convictions and lacked transparency in a way that belies Harris’ brand as a “progressive prosecutor.” In March 2010, just as Harris was campaigning to become California’s attorney general, San Francisco authorities shut down a police department crime lab in the city’s Hunters Point naval yard.