Kamala Harris is stepping back into the political arena to help Democrats compete in closely contested midterm races as the former vice president weighs whether to seek the presidency again in 2028.
Harris, the Democrats’ unsuccessful 2024 presidential nominee, has made relatively few public appearances this year.
But with the party seeking to break Republicans’ hold on Congress ahead of the Nov. 3 elections, she is campaigning in Georgia, Mississippi, Nevada, New Hampshire and Wisconsin. The tour could renew speculation about her political ambitions as a growing field of potential 2028 presidential contenders begins to emerge.
She launched the tour Tuesday in Las Vegas with a new stump speech criticizing what she described as President Donald Trump’s cruelty, while drawing on the aspirational messaging that has long defined her public appearances. Harris made history as the first woman and the first Black and South Asian American to serve as vice president.
She spoke to scores of Culinary Workers Union members alongside gubernatorial candidate Aaron Ford, Nevada’s first Black attorney general. Harris said Ford would become the “first Black governor west of the Mississippi” if elected.
“We got a serious fight in front of us,” Harris said. “We are witnessing pure brutality come out of what is undoubtedly the most corrupt, callous and incompetent presidential administration.”
Like Trump, who is traveling around the country to campaign for Republican candidates, Harris is not broadly popular among voters. A Reuters/Ipsos opinion poll in June showed that 39% of Americans viewed her favorably, but the figures were sharply divided along partisan lines: 82% of Democrats viewed her favorably, compared with 7% of Republicans and 33% of independents.
“At the end of a campaign, you bring out your heavy hitters,” said Elaine Kamarck, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a member of the Democratic National Committee. “That’s what’s going on here with her, and frankly with Trump.”
The day after her Las Vegas appearance, Harris led chants of “Mississippi matters!” before a crowd supporting Scott Colom in Columbus, Mississippi. Colom is seeking to become the first Democrat elected to the U.S. Senate from Mississippi since 1982. Polls show an unusually tight race with Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith.
Harris opened with advice she said she gives young people she mentors: “Never let someone else’s limited ability to see your capacity be a limitation on your ambition,” she said. “Let me repeat that.” She repeated the line more loudly, drawing cheers from the crowd.
Undecided on 2028
If Harris decides to run for the White House again in 2028, she would likely be among the most high-profile names in what is expected to be a crowded Democratic field.
But Harris also carries the baggage of past defeats. She lost the 2024 presidential election to Trump, and her first presidential campaign ended before the 2020 Democratic nominating contests began.
A 2028 campaign would also force Harris to revisit the Democrats’ tumultuous 2024 race, when then-President Joe Biden abruptly ended his reelection campaign amid questions about his health and mental acuity, and Harris replaced him as the party’s nominee.
Harris has since called Biden’s decision to seek reelection “reckless” in her memoir, “107 Days,” a reference to the short campaign she inherited. This month, she offered her clearest criticism yet of Biden’s support for Israel’s war in Gaza, rebuking the Israeli government’s “horrific conduct” and saying the U.S. should have “acted sooner and more forcefully.”
“All these things will be relitigated,” Kamarck said. “What happened to Biden? Did she know? Did she think he was losing it? And on and on and on.”
Scott Ferson, a Democratic strategist and author of “How the Democrats Lost America,” said the party has tended to give short shrift to candidates who have lost elections. However, voters disillusioned with Trump may also view Harris in a new light.
“She has that kind of crossover appeal,” Ferson said, “particularly with people who left in 2024 or stayed home.” Her implicit message, he suggested, is: “Do you regret staying home?”
Earlier this month, as Harris wrapped up an appearance on the “Baby, This Is Keke Palmer” video podcast, Palmer asked whether she would run again.
“Oh, girl, come on!” Harris said, laughing as she gripped the hands of the Hollywood star. “I haven’t decided yet.”
“But the midterms, the midterms, the midterms,” Harris continued. “2028 don’t matter if we don’t do 2026 right.”