The pick of a Vice Presidential running mate is not normally that big of a deal. It’s the background and positions of the Presidential nominee that people are focused on. However, in the case of Joe Biden, his pick of Kamala Harris from my home state of California is extremely important. Biden will be 78 if elected, the oldest person to ever hold the office. He’s already showing signs of deterioration and it seems highly unlikely that he will be able to seek a second term. He may well not make it through his first term. Thus, in considering the Biden/Harris ticket, we must evaluate each of the individuals assuming they will be president. From the standpoint of pro-family issues and values, they both would be terrible, but Kamala Harris would be a true disaster.
I managed the successful Proposition 8 campaign in California reaffirming in the state constitution that marriage is the union of one man and one woman. Harris was elected California’s Attorney General (barely) in 2010, two years after Proposition 8 passed. By that time, the initiative was embroiled in heavy litigation. Having survived numerous lawsuits in state court, it was challenged in 2010 in federal court. A homosexual judge, himself involved in a long-term same-sex relationship, presided over the case. (The judge never disclosed his conflict of interest during the trial.) The judge ruled that Prop. 8 violated the US Constitution and declared it invalid. However, the judge’s decision was put on hold so that the case could be appealed. This is where Harris’ duplicity became particularly evident.
As Attorney General, Kamala Harris ignored her oath of office and refused to defend Proposition 8 in court – a legally binding, validly enacted constitutional provision approved by millions of Californians – and also refused to appeal the federal court decision invalidating it. This resulted in an extraordinary legal situation, unprecedented in the history of California, where the proponents of the ballot measure had to step in to defend it because the person whose job it is refused to do so. The California Supreme Court ruled overwhelmingly that the sponsors of the measure were entitled to defend it in federal court, just as they had done in state court. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed, and then proceeded to rule against us, upholding the trial judge’s ruling invalidating the measure. So, the constitutionality of Proposition 8 was appealed to the US Supreme Court.
Once again, Harris refused to do her job and defend Prop. 8. The Proposition 8 case was among the most high-profile cases in the nation when it was argued before the Supreme Court in the spring of 2013. On June 26th of that year the US Supreme Court issued a devastating ruling stating that the proponents of Proposition 8 did not have standing in federal court to defend it and directed the Ninth Circuit to lift the stay against the trial judge’s ruling invalidating the initiative. It died for lack of a defense.
Two days later, Kamala Harris – who helped orchestrate the overturning of Prop. 8 – officiated the “wedding” of the two male plaintiffs who brought the case challenging the constitutionality of Proposition 8.
Think about the damage to the rule of law and the constitution that Kamala Harris created in her unconscionable decision to refuse to defend Proposition 8. She unilaterally left the people undefended in federal court. Imagine if the people had enacted a ballot measure, or the Legislature passed a bill, to enact something highly-sought by the left, say to impose gun control. Can you imagine the hue and cry from the media and the left if the Attorney General refused to defend the law in court and it was overturned for lack of a defense? There would be massive public protests and demands that she resign. But because she is a Democrat in a heavily blue state, and because the media and the elites are all in favor of the LGBT agenda, no meaningful criticism of her unconscionable actions was heard from them.
Kamala Harris’ conduct concerning Proposition 8 is not the only thing of concern, not by a long shot. She is a prime sponsor of the Equality Act in Congress that would impose vast elements of the extreme LGBT agenda on the American people, including cementing in federal law the dangerous notion that a person’s sex is not determined by biology but instead by “gender identity.” When campaigning for president at an event sponsored by the country’s largest gay lobby group, Harris introduced herself using her “preferred pronouns” to pander for their support. Joe Biden himself has pledged to make passage of the Equality Act his top legislative priority.
Harris is equally disastrous for Americans who are pro-life and who believe in religious liberty. As Attorney General, rather than prosecuting Planned Parenthood for illegally harvesting and selling body parts of aborted infants, Harris instead prosecuted the undercover journalists who documented Planned Parenthood’s misdeeds. She also was a co-sponsor of legislation that attempted to force pro-life crisis pregnancy centers to publish information to their clients about how they could obtain a free or low-cost abortion. Unlike Proposition 8, Harris vigorously defended that law in court. Thankfully, the US Supreme Court invalidated it.
Suffice to say that there is no circumstance where Kamala Harris would not unabashedly and unreservedly support aborting a child for any reason, or no reason.
I could go on and on about Kamala Harris’ despicable record. In her, the left not only has someone who agrees wholeheartedly with every aspect of their agenda, but someone willing to cheat and scheme to achieve it. Under Kamala Harris the “rule of law” means “the laws I support will rule.”
Americans have a big decision this November. In choosing between Joe Biden and Donald Trump, voters must also consider if they want an unconscionable schemer and cheater like Kamala Harris to be a heartbeat away from the presidency.