In the world of American politics this week, all eyes will be on the Democratic National Convention between August 19 to 22 as Kamala Harris is expected to officially accept the party’s presidential nomination ahead of the US elections later this year. Harris’ political career has been elevated after Joe Biden stepped out of the race. {"@context":"https://schema.
org","@type":"ImageObject","caption":"Kamala Harris with her sister and niece, Maya (right) and Meena (left). Photo: @mayaharris_/Instagram","url":"https://img.i-scmp.
com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=contain,width=1024,format=auto/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2024/08/19/738efc60-b619-42d1-ab30-fd0ccca72be4_d7491f3d.jpg"} Kamala Harris with her sister and niece, Maya (right) and Meena (left). Photo: @mayaharris_/Instagram As the spotlight turns to Harris, her close relationships with her sister Maya and her niece Meena have also grabbed attention because of the powerful bond between the three women.
Maya, who is one of Kamala’s most outspoken advocates on social media, has backed her sister’s political career for years, with her own work even taking a back seat. Here is what you need to know about Kamala’s biggest cheerleader. What is Kamala Harris’ relationship like with her sister, Maya Harris? {"@context":"https://schema.
org","@type":"ImageObject","caption":"“I would not be the same person without my brilliant and thoughtful sister by my side,” Kamala Harris said of Maya Harris on national sibling day. They’re pictured here as kids back in the day. Photo: @kamalaharris/Instagram","url":"https://img.
i-scmp.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=contain,width=1024,format=auto/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2024/08/19/d2b07c70-4a81-4222-a7c7-2c8f44d014ae_bf8b2101.jpg"} “I would not be the same person without my brilliant and thoughtful sister by my side,” Kamala Harris said of Maya Harris on national sibling day.
They’re pictured here as kids back in the day. Photo: @kamalaharris/Instagram It’s no secret that the sisters are particularly close, with their bond going back to their childhoods. Per The Washington Post, their parents, Donald and Shyamala , split when they were young.
Donald was an economics professor and Shyamala a scientist. The sisters would sometimes travel with Shyamala on work assignments, spending time at hotels across the world. “We leaned on each other.
We forged a bond that is unbreakable. When I think about it, all of the joyous moments in our lives, all of the challenging moments, all of the moments of transition, we have always been together,” Kamala said in an interview with the publication. Maya also officiated the wedding ceremony when Kamala married Doug Emhoff in 2014 .
Kamala Harris’ sister Maya was her political adviser {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"ImageObject","caption":"Kamala Harris and her sister Maya Harris in 2004, on Thanksgiving. Photo: @mayaharris_/Instagram","url":"https://img.
i-scmp.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=contain,width=1024,format=auto/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2024/08/19/08b06127-1641-45c1-913f-30aee42d4cdb_64511ff8.jpg"} Kamala Harris and her sister Maya Harris in 2004, on Thanksgiving.
Photo: @mayaharris_/Instagram The close relationship between Kamala and her sister extended to their professional careers, with Maya taking on a prominent role in her sister’s political life. Per The Washington Post, Maya worked with Kamala on her first campaign to be San Francisco’s district attorney, and spoke at her inauguration in 2004. Then Maya was a senior adviser for Hillary Clinton in 2016 and later served as Kamala’s campaign chairwoman during her first presidential bid in 2020.
Per the publication, Maya quit her job as an MSNBC analyst to volunteer for her sister’s campaign. Like her sister, she studied law {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"ImageObject","caption":"Maya Harris and Kamala Harris are both law graduates.
Photo: @mayaharris_/Instagram","url":"https://img.i-scmp.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=contain,width=1024,format=auto/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2024/08/19/7a32f91e-53a1-4605-bb2b-8ff4bd59b982_d7491f3d.
jpg"} Maya Harris and Kamala Harris are both law graduates. Photo: @mayaharris_/Instagram Both sisters studied law, with Maya earning her bachelor’s degree at UC Berkeley and her law degree at Stanford. Per Stanford Lawyer Magazine, she said that her parents’ love for activism first encouraged her to study law: “I knew at a very early age that I was going to one day have a career that would allow me to work for social justice and focus on improving the quality of people’s lives.
” According to The Washington Post, Maya had a leadership role at the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California and played a key role in criminal justice reform. She also held executive positions at the Ford Foundation and, at 29, was one of the youngest law school deans at the Lincoln Law School in Sacramento, per Town & Country magazine. She was a young mum to Meena {"@context":"https://schema.
org","@type":"ImageObject","caption":"Kamala Harris’ sister, Maya, with her daughter Meena back in the day. Photo: @mayaharris_/Instagram","url":"https://img.i-scmp.
com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=contain,width=1024,format=auto/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2024/08/19/0b5dd8a3-f153-4354-b7e7-0b46310a3512_d7491f3d.jpg"} Kamala Harris’ sister, Maya, with her daughter Meena back in the day. Photo: @mayaharris_/Instagram Maya was 17 years old when she got pregnant with her daughter Meena.
The Washington Post reports that nobody knew she was pregnant, and she graduated high school while around eight months into her pregnancy. Per the publication, Maya has remained largely mum on that period of her life, never revealing the father of her child nor the circumstances around the pregnancy. When she was in university, her mum helped babysit so she could follow her dreams.
{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"ImageObject","caption":"Meena Harris, like Maya and Kamala Harris, is also a lawyer. Photo: @mayaharris_/Instagram","url":"https://img.
i-scmp.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=contain,width=1024,format=auto/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2024/08/19/c44a4c5d-eec4-4a89-9774-d558661bc581_c6c9c404.jpg"} Meena Harris, like Maya and Kamala Harris, is also a lawyer.
Photo: @mayaharris_/Instagram Like her aunt and mum, Meena is a lawyer who studied at Stanford and Harvard Law. She has worked at Uber and Slack, and, per People, is the CEO and founder of the Phenomenal Woman Action Campaign. The organisation was inspired by Maya Angelou’s Phenomenal Woman poem, and, according to Town & Country, her organisation aims to bring awareness around social issues that women face.
Meena is also an author and wrote a children’s picture book , Kamala and Maya’s Big Idea . {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"ImageObject","caption":"Maya Harris with her husband, Tony West.
Photo: @mayaharris_/Instagram","url":"https://img.i-scmp.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=contain,width=1024,format=auto/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2024/08/19/9b9a2d55-90e1-4ab4-896b-2f32732c507b_147dc7c0.
jpg"} Maya Harris with her husband, Tony West. Photo: @mayaharris_/Instagram It was while studying law that Maya met her then future husband, Tony West. He told Stanford Lawyer Magazine that “the best thing that came out of law school was that I met my wife”.
According to The Washington Post, West even helped look after baby Meena. He is currently the chief legal officer at Uber. She’s been vocal about her lupus In an essay published on The Atlantic in 2020, Maya revealed that she had lupus.
She confirmed that she had been diagnosed when she was in university and had been treating her disease for three decades. She explained that she opened up about her condition after former President Donald Trump famously claimed that hydroxychloroquine could be used to prevent Covid-19. At the time, the drug’s efficacy in Covid-19 treatment was unproven and it was widely used to control lupus symptoms.
Maya said statements like Trump’s had dangerous implications for people who needed the drug to treat serious health conditions. Kamala Harris is expected to officially become the Democratic Party’s nominee this week after Joe Biden stepped down – but who’s her sister Maya, often seen behind the scenes of her political career? Born to Donald and Shyamala, the 2 sisters shared an ‘unbreakable’ bond growing up; Maya is now married to Uber’s chief legal officer Tony West, whom she met at law school in Stanford.
