In a special situation, the governor’s race in California would have already got taken form. Aspiring candidates would have been making appearances across the state. Donors would have begun bankrolling their favorites, and organizations would have began to announce endorsements.
As an alternative, Kamala Harris got here dwelling.
The previous vice chairman, after a stinging defeat within the presidential race final 12 months, has shaken up the 2026 governor’s race by her mere presence in California. Hypothesis has grown every week since her return from Washington: Will she or gained’t she enter the race?
After flying again to Los Angeles final month, Ms. Harris has stood with firefighters in Altadena, greeted evacuees at a Pink Cross shelter and toured fireplace harm in Pacific Palisades. Throughout her most up-to-date cease, she did little to quell hypothesis.
“I’m right here, and could be right here, whatever the workplace I maintain, as a result of it’s the proper factor to do,” Ms. Harris mentioned when reporters pressed her about whether or not she was working for governor.
The likelihood has made it troublesome for many different Democrats to maneuver ahead, realizing that any calculations they make now could be upended if Ms. Harris entered the race. The 2026 contest to interchange Gov. Gavin Newsom, who can not run once more due to time period limits, is at present populated by lesser-known aspirants, lots of whom probably would step apart if Ms. Harris determined to run.
“She hasn’t frozen the sphere, however positively made it icy sufficient to power everybody to decelerate and watch their step,” mentioned Dan Newman, a Democratic strategist who suggested Mr. Newsom throughout his campaigns for governor.
Ms. Harris is weighing whether or not to run for governor subsequent 12 months, run for president in 2028 or pursue a job outside of elected office, in keeping with an individual with data of her deliberations. She has put collectively an advisory crew that features former White Home workers, veteran Democratic strategists, coverage consultants, a speechwriter and a fund-raiser.
Working for governor would possibly appear to be a step down for somebody who served 4 years because the vice chairman and was the Democratic nominee for president. However by doing so, Ms. Harris would keep away from the aggressive slog of a presidential major and have a robust probability to guide the nation’s most populous state with the assistance of fellow Democrats who management the legislature. Ms. Harris has gained in California each time she’s been on the statewide poll — as a candidate for president, vice chairman, senator and legal professional basic.
By this level eight years in the past, the final time California had an open governor’s seat, the main Democratic candidates had totally launched their campaigns and Mr. Newsom had emerged because the front-runner in polls. Although the first election remains to be 16 months away, it takes longer in California than elsewhere for candidates to boost cash and change into recognized to voters throughout an enormous state with costly media markets.
To date, the declared Democratic candidates embrace the lieutenant governor, the schools superintendent, a former mayor of Los Angeles, a former state controller and a former legislative leader. Although they’ve begun to boost cash and search endorsements, they are little-known to voters, making the race an unpredictable free-for-all.
Eleni Kounalakis, the lieutenant governor, was the primary to leap into the governor’s race when she declared her candidacy in April 2023. On the time, the likelihood that Ms. Harris would possibly enter the race was on few minds.
As a result of Ms. Kounalakis and Ms. Harris have been mates for greater than 20 years, it’s troublesome to think about them working in opposition to one another. Their friendship dates again to when Ms. Harris was the San Francisco district legal professional and Ms. Kounalakis was working her household’s home-building firm in the identical metropolis, “each younger girls, attempting to navigate the halls of energy,” Ms. Kounalakis mentioned in a speech on the Democratic Nationwide Conference. Ms. Kounalakis was not obtainable for remark.
Whereas most Democrats are in wait-and-see mode, the prospect of Ms. Harris’s entry appears to have energized some Republicans. Chad Bianco, the sheriff of Riverside County, launched his marketing campaign on Monday. Steve Hilton, a Fox Information commentator and former adviser to Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain who lives in Silicon Valley, can be weighing a run. And Richard Grenell, who has a house in Manhattan Seashore, Calif., and is President Trump’s envoy for particular missions, mentioned final week that he would contemplate working for California governor — if Ms. Harris will get into the race.
Such candidates would face lengthy odds in a state that has not elected a Republican to statewide workplace since 2006, when voters re-elected Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor. However Republicans imagine competing in opposition to Ms. Harris, particularly after her loss to President Trump, might energize their supporters and entice extra donations.
“She could be a really engaging opponent to Republicans,” mentioned Matt Shupe, a marketing campaign strategist who’s advising Mr. Hilton.
If Ms. Harris does run, it will be a uncommon transfer for somebody who got here so near the presidency. Solely 4 vice presidents have run for governor, and one dropped out to assist one other candidate, in keeping with Joel Goldstein, an emeritus regulation professor at Saint Louis College who has studied the historical past of vice presidents.
In 1804, Aaron Burr misplaced his race for governor of New York, an consequence that he blamed on Alexander Hamilton earlier than he shot Mr. Hamilton lifeless of their well-known duel. In 1894, Levi Morton, the vice chairman below President Benjamin Harrison, gained the New York governor’s race.
Essentially the most direct parallel, nevertheless, was Richard Nixon. In 1960, Mr. Nixon, then the Republican vice chairman, misplaced the presidential race to John F. Kennedy. He returned dwelling to Southern California and ran for governor in 1962.
Mr. Nixon adjusted to the parochial nature of a governor’s race and pledged to go to each county within the state, in keeping with information accounts. He signed autographs within the rain within the Sierra Nevada foothills, posed for pictures with “coonskin capped” mountain males and performed piano for potato farmers close to the Oregon border, The Los Angeles Instances reported in February 1962.
Within the 2026 governor’s race, some distinguished Democrats have but to announce their intentions as Ms. Harris weighs her resolution.
Katie Porter, the previous congresswoman recognized for viral moments wherein she grilled executives along with her whiteboard on Capitol Hill, has made a number of journeys to Sacramento in latest weeks to satisfy with labor leaders and others who’re influential in Democratic politics — indications that she has been laying the groundwork to get within the race. However she additionally has recommended that she and others could be unlikely to tackle Ms. Harris.
“If Vice President Harris have been to decide on to run, I’m sure that that will have a close to field-clearing impact on the Democratic aspect,” Ms. Porter said at a post-election dialogue in December.
One other Democratic chief has determined to forgo the governor’s race. Rob Bonta, California’s legal professional basic, had been contemplating a run however introduced this month that he’ll as a substitute search re-election because the state’s high lawyer and can assist Ms. Harris if she runs for governor.
Not each Democrat would scatter. Two candidates who’re positioning themselves as business-friendly moderates mentioned that they may keep within the race even when Ms. Harris jumps in. Antonio Villaraigosa, a former Los Angeles mayor who ran unsuccessfully for governor in 2018 and now works for the cryptocurrency firm Coinbase, mentioned that he’s working once more as a result of too many Californians are combating the price of residing.
“As a result of nothing has modified for them, nothing has modified for me,” Mr. Villaraigosa mentioned.
Stephen Cloobeck, an actual property developer who has given his marketing campaign $3 million, mentioned Ms. Harris’s time in Washington has left her disconnected from California voters.“I welcome her coming into the race if she decides to try this,” he mentioned.
It’s not clear when Ms. Harris would possibly decide.
Lorena Gonzalez, the president of the California Labor Federation and a former Democratic state lawmaker, mentioned that the prospect of Ms. Harris’s entry has “slowed all the things down.”
The labor federation has invited candidates for governor to talk to union members at an occasion in Could to start contemplating an endorsement.
“We by no means thought that will look too early,” Ms. Gonzalez mentioned. “However now it looks like it may be.”
In 1962, the final time a vice chairman got here dwelling to run for governor, Mr. Nixon misplaced to Edmund G. “Pat” Brown, the Democratic incumbent.
It was that defeat that led Mr. Nixon to tell reporters, “You gained’t have Nixon to kick round anymore as a result of, gents, that is my final press convention.”
Six years later, he was elected president.
Orlando Mayorquín and Jesus Jiménez contributed reporting. Sheelagh McNeill, Andrés R. Martínez and Yan Zhuang contributed analysis.
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