A Guide to Kamala Harris's Family Tree (2024)

Vice President Kamala Harris wrote in her memoir that her mother always said to her, "Kamala, you may be the first to do many things. Make sure you're not the last."

Now, as Kamala Harris is on the verge of making history as the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, her family is back in the spotlight. Here, her family tree—featuring the Harris, Gopalan, and Emhoff families, all the extended family of Vice President Harris:

Below, meet all the members of Kamala Harris's family.

Donald J. Harris (b. August 23, 1938) was born in Brown's Town, Jamaica, to Oscar Joseph Harris and Beryl Christie Finegan, Afro-Jamaicans. Oscar's parents were, Joseph Alexander Harris and Christiana Brown. Christiana, who went by Chrisy, was reportedly the descendant of Hamilton Brown, a plantation and slave owner and founder of Brown's Town, Jamaica.

"As a child growing up in Jamaica, I often heard it said, by my parents and family friends: 'memba whe yu cum fram,'" Donald wrote in a 2019 essay in Jamaica Global. "To this day, I continue to retain the deep social awareness and strong sense of identity which that grassroots Jamaican philosophy fed in me. As a father, I naturally sought to develop the same sensibility in my two daughters."

"He was a brilliant student," Kamala writes in her memoir, The Truths We Hold, of her father. He studied at the University College of the West Indies, before earning his Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of London in 1960. In 1960, he immigrated to the U.S. after being admitted to University of California at Berkeley, and he received his PhD from UC Berkley in 1966. At Berkeley, he met Shyamala Gopalan (see below). As Post-Keynesian economist and development theorist, he taught at University of Illinois, Northwestern, and University of Wisconsin, but he spent the majority of his career at Stanford University.

In 2021, he received the Order of Merit, a Jamaica National Award. "I think of myself as ‘a likkle country boy’ from Brown’s Town in St Ann who got started in life with a level of social awareness and sense of belonging and love of country that were given to me by my early upbringing in that little community," Donald told the Jamaica Observer in response to the honor. "It made me commit to a lifetime of study and learning and analysis to understand what accounts for the inequality that I continued to keenly observe in the conditions of economic life for people around me and in the world at large, and to search for public policies to improve those conditions. In that process I also sought to give back in terms of service to the country and community that brought me up. That remains today as a core value in my thinking and my work."

Shyamala Gopalan (b. December 7, 1938, d. February 11, 2009), was born in what was then Madras, British India (now Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India). Her father, P. V. Gopalan (b. 1911, d. 1998), was an Indian civil servant, and her mom Rajam Gopalan, was a community organizer. Shyamala has three younger siblings: G. Balachandran ("Balu"), an economist and computer scientist in New Dehli; Sarala, an obstetrician in Chennai; and Chinni, an information scientist in Ontario.

Kamala is close with her chitthis (aunts) Sarala and Chinni and her uncle Balu, shouting them out in her DNC address in 2020. "I was actually very touched," Chinni Subash said at the time. "I mean, with everything that she has to take care of these days ... I was very touched and very honored that she acknowledged us."

Kamala often cites her mom, and her maternal grandparents as a major inspiration. "My mother had been raised in a household where political activism and civic leadership came naturally," she wrote in her memoir. "Her mother, my grandmother, Rajam Gopalan, had never attended high school, but she was a skilled community organizer. She would take in women who were being abused by their husbands, and then she’d call the husbands and tell them they’d better shape up or she would take care of them. She used to gather village women together, educating them about contraception. My grandfather P. V. Gopalan had been part of the movement to win India’s independence. Eventually, as a senior diplomat in the Indian government, he and my grandmother had spent time living in Zambia after it gained independence, helping to settle refugees. He used to joke that my grandmother’s activism would get him in trouble one day. But he knew that was never going to stop her. From them, my mother learned that it was service to others that gave life purpose and meaning. And from my mother, Maya and I learned the same."

Shyamala graduated from the University of Delhi when she was 19 years old in 1958, and immigrated to America to pursue a doctorate in endocrinology at University of California Berkeley, where she met Donald J. Harris. "She and my father met and fell in love at Berkeley while participating in the civil rights movement," Kamala writes in her memoir. "Her marriage—and her decision to stay in the United States—were the ultimate acts of self-determination and love." Shyamala and Donald divorced in the early 70s.

She earned her PhD in nutrition and endocrinology in 1965, and worked as a breast cancer researcher at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, University of Wisconsin, Lady Davis Institute for Medical Research, McGill University Faculty of Medicine, and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. She died in 2009 of colon cancer; Shyamala was 70 years old.

Douglas Emhoff (b. October 13, 1964) is the son of Jewish parents Barbara Kanzer and Michael Emhoff. He was born in Brooklyn, New York, and grew up in the New Jersey suburbs. He has two siblings, Jamie Emhoff and Andy Emhoff. At age 17, his family moved to Southern California, and he graduated from Agoura High School. He attended California State University, Northridge, graduation with a Bachelor of Arts degree in communication in 1987, then received his Juris Doctor from USC Gould School of Law in 1990.

In 1992, Doug married Kerstin Mackin (b. 1967); they divorced in 2008. They have two children, Cole Emhoff (b. 1994) and Ella Emhoff (b. 1999) (see below), named for John Coltrane and Ella Fitzgerald. In 2013, he was set up with Kamala on a date by her best friend, Chrisette. Kerstin and Kamala are friends, with Kamala writing in her memoir, "we sometimes joke that our modern family is almost a little two functional." Kamala and Doug married in August 2014, in a ceremony officiated by Kamala's sister Maya. "In keeping with our respective Indian and Jewish heritage, I put a flower garland around Doug's neck, and he stomped on a glass."

Doug is the first Jewish spouse of an American president or vice president, and the first ever Second Gentleman. He currently teaches at Georgetown Law.

Cole Emhoff (b. September 15, 1994) is the only son of Doug and Kerstin Emhoff. He graduated from Colorado College in 2017, and currently works as an executive assistant at Plan B Entertainment.

On October 14 2023, he married Greenley Littlejohn, who works as a global product development manager at Brand I.D. in Los Angeles. She graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with a Bachelor of Science in retail merchandising in 2017. Greenely's dad, Jeffrey Littlejohn, is a Professor of History at Sam Houston State University (SHSU).

Kamala officiated Greenley and Cole's wedding. "It meant so much for so many reasons," Harris said. "It was so wonderful that the kids asked me to do it. For us, we think of marriage as being not just between these two people, but the coming together of families. So it was very much with that spirit that we all participated."

She added, "I love my husband. I love our marriage. I want for those two [Cole and Greenley] to have a loving marriage where they are best friends and they know that it’s not just them against the world, that our family supports them. That the community of people that came together at the wedding supports [them]."

Ella Emhoff (b. May 29, 1999), the only daughter of Doug and Kerstin, is a model and fashion designer. Ella attended Parsons School of Design, where she majored in fine arts, and graduated in 2017. In 2021, she signed with IMG Models. IMG's president, Ivan Bart, said, "It’s not really about shape, size or gender any more. Ella communicates this moment in time. There’s a cheekiness and a joy she exudes."

"Growing up, I never saw myself as someone stylish, at all," she told Elle in 2021. "Obviously, I loved fashion and cared a lot about it. But I was really into doing my own thing and being really comfortable in my own body, you know? I never saw myself as a 'fashion person.' And I don’t know if my classmates did either! So now… [it feels] strange. But it also makes me feel really good, because I was able to stick with my true instincts when it came to style, and it actually I paid off!" She added, "It’s not the actual clothes you’re wearing. It’s the confidence you have, and the ability to live your life, in those clothes. In April 2022, she launched her own knitwear line, and in October 2023, she launched a knitting club.

Though her father is Jewish, Ella doesn't identify as Jewish. "Ella truly has no qualms with the faith, but she does not want to speak on behalf of Judaism, as she does not celebrate herself," a spokesperson said in 2021.

Maya Harris (b. January 30, 1967), is the younger daughter of Shyamala Gopalan and Donald Harris. She welcomed daughter, Meena Harris (see below), in 1984.

Maya received her Bachelor of Arts degree from University of California, Berkeley, in 1989, and then attended Stanford Law School, receiving her Juris Doctorate with distinction in 1992. After graduating, she clerked for District Court Judge James Ware, then worked in civil and criminal litigation. She became a law professor, teaching at University of San Francisco School of Law, U.C. Hatings College of the Law, and New College of California School of Law.

Maya also worked at PolicyLink, the Ford Foundation, the American Civil Liberties Union, and the Center for American Progress. In 2016, she was a senior policy advisor on Hilary Clinton's presidential campaign, helping to draft the platform, and in 2020, she was chairwoman of her sister's campaign for president.

In July 1998, she married Tony West (b. 1965), her Stanford Law classmate, though they didn't begin dating until after graduating. West, the son of Margaret "Peggy" Reddick and Franklin "Frank" Delano West, is from San Francisco. He graduated from Harvard in 1987 before attending Stanford Law, and after graduating, he started working in Democratic politics. He started working for the Justice Department in 1993, and in 1994, was appointed as an Assistant United States Attorney (AUSA) for the Northern District of California.

From 2001 to 2009, he was a partner at Morrison & Foerster LLP. In 2009, President Obama appointed West to serve as Assistant Attorney General of the Department of Justice Civil Division, and in 2013, he became Associate Attorney General. After leaving the Obama administration, he became a vice president at PepsiCo, and starting in 2017, he became General Counsel at Uber. He Instagrams as @meenasdad.

Meena Harris (b. October 20, 1984) is Maya Harris's only daughter; Maya had her when she was just 17 years old. Growing up in Oakland, Meena attended Bishop O'Dowd High School. She graduated from Stanford in 2006. In 2012, she received her Juris Doctor from Harvard Law School.

In 2017, Meena founded Phenomenal, a consumer and media company that "elevates the stories of women and underrepresented communities through entertainment, digital content, brand partnerships, book clubs, and more." She also authored children's books, including Kamala and Maya's Big Idea, about her mom and aunt, and is a Tony-award winning producer for A Strange Loop. She also produced Suffs.

In 2014, Meena married Nikolas "Nik" Ajagu, who worked as the Global Head of Partnerships at Facebook until 2019. Nik and Meena met back in 2007 while they both worked at Facebook. They have two daughters: Amara Ajagu (b. 2016) and Leela Ajagu (b. 2018).

In the acknowledgements in her memoir, Kamala writes, "Meena, I remember you at two years old, walking around the house, literally in my shoes. Now you're a leader in your own right who has forged an important path and whose advice I cherish. Thank you for everything, especially for my baby nieces, Amara and Leela, and their amazing dad, Nik."