Vice President Kamala Harris' Net Worth Revealed

Forbes

The vice president has plenty of money, but now that she's the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, her personal finances will receive more attention than ever.  Read the full story on Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/sites/kylemullins/2024/05/26/heres-how-much-kamala-harris-is-worth/  Subscribe to FORBES: https://www.youtube.com/user/Forbes?sub_confirmation=1  Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:  https://account.forbes.com/membership/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=growth_non-sub_paid_subscribe_ytdescript  Stay Connected Forbes newsletters: https://newsletters.editorial.forbes.com Forbes on Facebook: http://fb.com/forbes Forbes Video on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/forbes Forbes Video on Instagram: http://instagram.com/forbes More From Forbes:  http://forbes.com  Forbes covers the intersection of entrepreneurship, wealth, technology, business and lifestyle with a focus on people and success.

Transcript

00:00Today on Forbes, here's how much Kamala Harris is worth.

00:05Forbes originally published an article on Vice President Harris' net worth in May.

00:10Since then, the ground has shifted under the Democratic Party.

00:13On Sunday, President Biden announced that he would suspend his re-election campaign

00:18and endorsed Harris to run in his place.

00:21It now appears that she is the presumptive Democratic nominee for president.

00:26Thanks to her decades in government and a wealthy husband,

00:29Kamala Harris has built quite a nest egg.

00:31Forbes estimates her net worth, along with second gentleman Doug Emhoff,

00:36at about $8 million, up from $7 million in 2021.

00:41Vice President Harris and her husband own a multi-million-dollar home in Los Angeles.

00:46The rest of their assets mostly consist of cash, index funds, bonds, and pensions,

00:51which the 59-year-old Harris will soon be able to access.

00:55The second couple's net worth increase comes almost entirely from a jump in the value of that L.A. home,

01:01and the duo's liquid investments do not appear to have grown significantly,

01:04despite the soaring stock market.

01:07Harris was born in Oakland, California in October 1964 to two well-educated immigrants.

01:14Her father, originally from Jamaica, worked as an economics professor at Stanford.

01:18Her mother, from southern India, researched breast cancer.

01:22The pair met at the University of California, Berkeley,

01:25and after marrying, had Kamala and her sister, Maya.

01:29In her 2019 memoir, Harris writes,

01:32"...we weren't rich in financial terms, but the values we internalized provided a different kind of wealth."

01:38From an early age, Harris showed an interest in law.

01:42She moved across the country in 1982 to attend the historically black Howard University,

01:47and later got a job at the Federal Trade Commission

01:49and another as an intern for California Senator Alan Cranston,

01:53a Democrat whose seat she would later fill.

01:56Harris graduated in 1986 and returned to the West Coast,

02:00earning a law degree from UC Hastings in 1989.

02:04In 1998, she joined the San Francisco District Attorney's Office,

02:09buying an apartment in the city for $299,000.

02:13In 2003, Harris ran for San Francisco District Attorney.

02:17She won the race, beating a two-term incumbent.

02:21Harris initially made about $140,000 as San Francisco's DA,

02:25a figure that climbed to more than $200,000 in 2010.

02:29That year, she won a narrow victory to become the Attorney General of California,

02:34which offered more prestige but less money, cutting her salary to $159,000.

02:40At least the retirement benefits were generous.

02:43Her time in local and state offices

02:45earned her two pensions that Forbes estimates are worth just under $1 million today.

02:50The early 2010s shaped her finances in other ways.

02:54In 2012, following their mother's death,

02:56Harris and her sister sold her Oakland condo for $710,000,

03:01which local real estate agent Jerry Beverly confirmed.

03:04Two years later, Harris married Doug Emhoff,

03:07a Los Angeles-based entertainment lawyer whom she met through a friend.

03:11Then a managing partner at Venable LLP,

03:14he brought to the table both additional income and a well-funded IRA

03:18with dozens of stakes of individual stocks.

03:21In 2016, Harris ran for the U.S. Senate, and she won in a landslide.

03:26As a new senator, Harris received a small pay bump to $174,000 a year.

03:32Upon her swearing in, she had between $250,000 and $500,000 in a savings account

03:38and a similar amount of investments in retirement accounts, plus her pensions.

03:43The rest of the assets on her disclosure all came from Emhoff.

03:47The couple soon bought a two-bedroom apartment in D.C.

03:50for just under $1.8 million, borrowing $1.35 million.

03:55As a candidate for president in 2019, Forbes valued her net worth at $6 million,

04:01a figure boosted by Emhoff, who was raking in upwards of a million dollars a year as a lawyer.

04:06She ultimately became Joe Biden's running mate in 2020.

04:10They beat Donald Trump and Mike Pence, and in January 2021,

04:14Harris got another raise to $235,000 as vice president.

04:18Emhoff, for his part, stopped his lucrative legal work

04:22and began teaching law at Georgetown University.

04:25The second couple moved into the vice presidential residence at One Observatory Circle in D.C.

04:30and started liquidating assets.

04:32Harris sold her San Francisco apartment in March 2021 for $860,000,

04:38$560,000 more than she paid for it 23 years earlier.

04:43Next went the D.C. apartment for $1.85 million, a hair above its 2017 purchase price.

04:49Harris has also raked in more than $500,000 from books she published before taking office.

04:56For full coverage, check out Kyle Kahn Mullins' piece on Forbes.com.

05:02This is Kieran Meadows from Forbes.

05:04Thanks for tuning in.

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