How Kamala Harris And Her Husband Earned Over $7 Million While She Served In The U.S….

Harris brings the clout, while her husband attorney Doug Emhoff brings the big money.

^Senator Kamala Harris, who could become the first woman to serve as vice president of the United States, has made her household famous. But it’s her husband, Doug Emhoff, who has made it wealthy.

Since Harris and Emhoff married in 2014, he has generated more than three-quarters of the couple’s combined $11.5 million in earnings, working as a highly paid attorney in the private sector while Harris has been collecting more modest salaries in government.

While running in the Democratic primaries, Harris released 15 years of tax returns, detailing her finances back to 2004. That was the year she took office as district attorney in San Francisco, a role that allowed her to earn $142,000 her first year in office, according to tax filings. Over the next six years, she saw her wages steadily increase until they hit $202,000 in 2010, when she was elected attorney general of California. That position came with more power and prestige—but less money, her tax filings show. In her first year as attorney general, in 2011, she made $159,000. 

Kamala & Doug’s Total Earnings: 2004–2019

Kamala Harris released her tax returns going back to 2004, the first year she held elected office. Between 2004 and 2014 Harris had total earnings of $1.7 million. Doug Emhoff and Harris married in 2014 and have reported combined total earnings of $11.5 million between then and 2019. They’ve earned $7.7 million since Harris became a senator.

* Rounded to the nearest $5K

Two years later, a friend introduced her to Emhoff, who at the time worked as attorney in Los Angeles for a law firm called Venable (which separately rents space in one of Donald Trump’s buildings). In 2014, as Harris was finishing up her first term as attorney general, she and Emhoff got married. That year, she made $137,000, while Emhoff reported $1.1 million. Another $45,000 came from capital gains, dividends and other miscellaneous income. The couple’s combined earnings—listed for the first time on a joint filing—totaled $1.3 million. 

The next year California Senator Barbara Boxer announced she would not seek reelection in 2016. Within days, Harris announced her campaign for the seat. While she was running, Emhoff got rid of several stockholdings in companies that could be come a conflict like Caterpillar, Dominion Resources, Monsanto and Medtronic, opting to reinvest the proceeds in mutual funds and ETFs.

Harris won and headed to Washington, D.C. for the first time in 2017. Her new gig came with a roughly 10% pay bump; she earned $158,000 from the Senate that year. Meanwhile, Emhoff left Venable but maintained a partnership stake, and started at a new law firm called DLA Piper that September. In 2017 the couple also had income of $795,000 from pensions and annuities, as well as $50,000 from capital gains. Their total earnings in 2017 added up to $2.3 million.                  

Harris’ income from the Senate has held steady ever since, but like her running mate Joe Biden, she’s bolstered her earnings by writing on the side, eventually publishing a memoir called The Truths We Hold with Penguin Random House. In 2018 she earned $320,000 as an author. In total, Emhoff and Harris made about $2 million in 2018, including Harris’ earnings from writing, her Senate salary, as well as $1.5 million that Emhoff earned from Venable and DLA Piper.

In 2019 Harris earned another $265,000 from writing, while Emhoff made $2.8 million from DLA Piper, Venable and an LLC called Estherville Hotel Group.  

It’s not clear how Emhoff became connected to the hotel group, which is registered in Iowa and produced just $136 of passive income last year, according to their tax returns. The Biden campaign did not respond to a request for comment. Regardless, the hotel investment seems to be a rounding error.

Since Harris joined the Senate, she and Emhoff have earned more than $7 million, building up a fortune that Forbes estimated at $6 million last year. A large portion of that wealth is held in three homes in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Washington, D.C., which are worth an estimated $2.5 million altogether, after accounting for debt. 

They’ve given away a bit of money, too. Between 2004 and 2013, before Harris got married, she donated about $16,000 to charity. Between 2014 and 2019, the couple together gave $214,000. Recipients include two of their alma maters, Howard University and University of Southern California, as well as Emhoff’s daughter’s current college, Parsons School of Design.

There’s not as much information about the finances of Vice President Mike Pence. While running for office in 2016, he released his tax returns, showing annual income of $113,000 to $187,000. But, in allegiance with the president, he has refused to release his the documents since.

Additional reporting by Chase Peterson-Withorn