Beautiful Virgin Islands

Tuesday, Jun 03, 2025

Kamala Harris’s Jamaican-Born Father, Is a Prominent Economist

Kamala Harris’s Jamaican-Born Father, Is a Prominent Economist

Donald J. Harris, a Stanford’s economics professor, was the first Black scholar to receive tenure in Stanford’s economics department, and a prominent critic of mainstream economic theory from the left.

In a warm, encyclopedic tribute to her family Wednesday night, as she formally accepted the vice-presidential nomination, Senator Kamala Harris skimmed past any discussion of her father, Donald J. Harris, a Jamaican-born professor of economics at Stanford University.

The reason is common to many of Ms. Harris’s generation: She is a child of divorce, raised by a single mother who became her most profound influence.

As Ms. Harris has stepped into the national spotlight, Dr. Harris, now 81 and long retired from teaching, has remained mostly silent. His only recent comments about her, published on a Jamaican website run by an acquaintance, express a combination of pride in his daughter and bitterness over their estrangement.

He scolded her in a letter, which has since been removed from the site, for joking in an interview that, growing up in a Jamaican family, it was natural that she had smoked marijuana. “Speaking for myself and my immediate Jamaican family, we wish to categorically dissociate ourselves from this travesty,” he wrote.

Dr. Harris did not respond to requests for comment for this article.


Donald Harris holding his daughter Kamala in April 1965.


Despite his low profile in the election cycle, Dr. Harris is not an obscure figure. He was the first Black scholar to receive tenure in Stanford’s economics department, and a prominent critic of mainstream economic theory from the left.

The Stanford Daily, reporting in 1976, described him as a “Marxist scholar,” and said there was some opposition to granting him tenure because he was “too charismatic, a pied piper leading students astray from neo-Classical economics.”

One of his former students at Stanford, Robert A. Blecker, now a professor of economics at American University, said Dr. Harris’s work questioned orthodox assumptions about growth — for instance that lower wages would increase employment rates, or that lower interest rates always result in increased investment.

“He was certainly very outspoken and prominent in the profession at one time, but not in a public way,” Dr. Blecker said. “He was certainly not shy. When I saw Kamala grill Judge Kavanaugh at his hearing,” during his confirmation for the U.S. Supreme Court, “I saw echoes of her father grilling someone in a seminar.”

Dr. Harris was raised in a landowning family on the north coast of Jamaica by a paternal grandmother whom he described as “reserved and stern in look, firm with ‘the strap,’ but capable of the most endearing and genuine acts of love, affection and care.” Reserved and highly intelligent, he was more cut out for academia than activism, contemporaries said.

He arrived at the University of California, Berkeley, as a graduate student in 1961. There, he met Shyamala Gopalan, an Indian graduate student his age, who was pursuing a Ph.D. in nutrition and endocrinology.

Ms. Harris, their elder daughter, has written that the two “fell in love at Berkeley while participating in the civil rights movement,” and described learning about protests from a “stroller’s-eye view.” When the children were very young, Dr. Harris got a series of teaching jobs at colleges in Illinois and Wisconsin, moving the family repeatedly. The couple separated in 1969, when Ms. Harris was 5, and divorced two years later.

In “The Truths We Hold,” her 2018 memoir, Ms. Harris wrote that “had they been a little older, a little more emotionally mature, maybe the marriage could have survived. But they were so young. My father was my mother’s first boyfriend.”

The divorce was bitter. Ms. Harris recalls inviting both her parents to her high school graduation, “even though I knew they wouldn’t speak to each other,” and initially fearing that her mother would not show up. (She did, in a “very bright red dress and heels,” Ms. Harris wrote.)

Dr. Harris, in his 2018 essay, said his early, close contact with his daughters “came to an abrupt halt” after a contentious custody battle. He said the divorce settlement had been “based on the false assumption by the State of California that fathers cannot handle parenting (especially in the case of this father, ‘a neegroe from da eyelans,’ was the Yankee stereotype, who might just end up eating his children for breakfast!) Nevertheless I persisted, never giving up on my love for my children.”

This friction did not slow Dr. Harris’s professional rise, and he was granted tenure first at the University of Wisconsin and then at Stanford University. Dr. Harris’s 1978 book, “Capital Accumulation and Income Distribution,” is dedicated “to Kamala and Maya.”

His work was followed closely in Jamaica, said Renee Anne Shirley, who was an adviser to Jamaica’s prime minister in the early 2000s, a period when Dr. Harris served as an economic consultant to the government.

She recalled reading Dr. Harris’s dispatches from the United States as far back as 1965, when he published a lengthy article about Malcolm X in The Sunday Gleaner.

“In three years, he got tenure — think about it, a Black man — and then he left and went to go to Stanford? He is a big thing for us,” Ms. Shirley said. “He pushed the boundaries. He was way ahead of his time.”

Students described him as an attentive mentor. Lisa Cook, now a professor of economics and international relations at Michigan State University, recalled visiting him at Stanford in the 1980s, when she was weighing whether to pursue a doctorate in economics.

She said he treated her with unusual deference, inviting her to join him for a meal in the faculty club.

“I went to each one of the top 10 programs in the country, and nobody else took me to the faculty club,” Dr. Cook said.

Dr. Harris also stood out because he had deep knowledge of the historically Black college she had attended. Perhaps, she said, this was because his daughter Kamala had enrolled at Howard University, studying economics.

“Everybody wants the best for their children,” she said. “I’m sure he was hoping someone at Howard was taking Kamala under their wing.”

Newsletter

Related Articles

Beautiful Virgin Islands
0:00
0:00
Close
China Accuses US of Violating Trade Truce
Panama Port Owner Balances US-China Pressures
France Implements Nationwide Outdoor Smoking Ban to Protect Children
German Chancellor Merz Keeps Putin Guessing on Missile Strategy
Mandelson Criticizes UK's 'Fetish' for Abandoning EU Regulations
British Fishing Boat Owner Fined €30,000 by French Authorities
Dutch government falls as far-right leader Wilders quits coalition
Harvard Urges US to Unfreeze Funds for Public Health Research
Businessman Mauled by Lion at Luxury Namibian Lodge
Researchers Consider New Destinations Beyond the U.S.
53-Year-Old Doctor Claims Biological Age of 23
Trump Struggles to Secure Trade Deals With China and Europe
Russia to Return 6,000 Corpses Under Ukraine Prisoner Swap Deal
Microsoft Lays Off Hundreds More Amid Restructuring
Harvey Weinstein’s Publicist Embraces Notoriety
Macron and Meloni Seek Unity Despite Tensions
Trump Administration Accused of Obstructing Deportation Cases
Newark Mayor Sues Over Arrest at Immigration Facility
Center-Left Candidate Projected to Win South Korean Presidency
Trump’s Tariffs Predicted to Stall Global Economic Growth
South Korea’s President-Elect Expected to Take Softer Line on Trump and North Korea
Trump’s China Strategy Remains a Geopolitical Puzzle
Ukraine Executes Long-Range Drone Strikes on Russian Airbases
Conservative Karol Nawrocki wins Poland’s presidential election
Study Identifies Potential Radicalization Risk Among Over One Million Muslims in Germany
Good news: Annalena Baerbock Elected President of the UN General Assembly
Apple Appeals EU Law Over User Data Sharing Requirements
South Africa: "First Black Bank" Collapses after Being Looted by Owners
Poland will now withdraw from the EU migration pact after pro-Trump nationalist wins Election
"That's Disgusting, Don’t Say It Again": The Trump Joke That Made the President Boil
Trump Cancels NASA Nominee Over Democratic Donations
Paris Saint-Germain's Greatest Triumph Is Football’s Lowest Point
OnlyFans for Sale: From Lockdown Lifeline to Eight-Billion-Dollar Empire
Mayor’s Security Officer Implicated | Shocking New Details Emerge in NYC Kidnapping Case
Hegseth Warns of Potential Chinese Military Action Against Taiwan
OPEC+ Agrees to Increase Oil Output for Third Consecutive Month
Jamie Dimon Warns U.S. Bond Market Faces Pressure from Rising Debt
Turkey Detains Istanbul Officials Amid Anti-Corruption Crackdown
Taylor Swift Gains Ownership of Her First Six Albums
Bangkok Ranked World's Top City for Remote Work in 2025
Satirical Sketch Sparks Political Spouse Feud in South Korea
Indonesia Quarry Collapse Leaves Multiple Dead and Missing
South Korean Election Video Pulled Amid Misogyny Outcry
Asian Economies Shift Away from US Dollar Amid Trade Tensions
Netflix Investigates Allegations of On-Set Mistreatment in K-Drama Production
US Defence Chief Reaffirms Strong Ties with Singapore Amid Regional Tensions
Vietnam Faces Strategic Dilemma Over China's Mekong River Projects
Malaysia's First AI Preacher Sparks Debate on Islamic Principles
White House Press Secretary Criticizes Harvard Funding, Advocates for Vocational Training
France to Implement Nationwide Smoking Ban in Outdoor Spaces Frequented by Children
×