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It was grand opening day and, let’s be honest, few eyes were on Doug Emhoff.
The former entertainment lawyer was there to support his wife, Kamala Harris, the first woman, first black American, and first South Asian American to become vice president of the United States. He was there to celebrate the inauguration of President Joe Biden, the first president who has not been Donald Trump in four very long years. He was there alongside luminaries from the Obamas to inaugural poet Amanda Gorman, and his stepfamily and Harris, including daughter Ella Emhoff in sparkling tweed Miu Miu and adorable great-nieces Amara and Leela Ajagu, who wore Matching leopard coats in homage to Harris and his sister Maya.
Emhoff wore an overcoat and a gray suit. Ralph Lauren, if you’re wondering.
It doesn’t matter if you weren’t. Emhoff has made it clear he’s comfortable being a support player; his Twitter for the past few days has been full of sweet yelling at Harris, making Emhoff the subject of countless Jokes “woman guy” (While the meme was created to describe husbands trying to gain fame by talking about their wives, it has evolved to encompass guys who, like Emhoff, genuinely love their wives).
The day before the opening, Emhoff wrote to GQ about the experience of joining the Biden-Harris campaign: “Almost overnight I went from being a lawyer to being a member of a wrestling team. for justice and trying to turn the page in the dark. chapter in the history of our nation.
But he must have known that that day could come when he met the woman who is now his wife. After all, on their first date Harris was already California Attorney General and widely regarded as a rising star in the Democratic Party. Indeed, theirs is a kind of political marriage that Americans have never seen before, at least at this level of government.
This is an example of “professionals who have come together later in life and are there to support each other,” Farida Jalalzai, a political science professor who studies women leaders, told Vox.
For Emhoff, that meant looking for former second daughters to figure out how to approach his role. And for America, that will mean watching a professionally successful white man step back from his career during his peak years to help his wife achieve her goals – and, at least according to his recent statements, to get herself. devote to public service. Doug Emhoff isn’t the center of attention right now, and in a way, that’s important too.
When they first met Harris was already a powerful politician
Emhoff and Harris first met in 2013, on a blind date by a mutual friend. Harris had served as attorney general for two years, after spending six years as a district attorney in San Francisco. She was already well known nationally, discussed as a potential replacement for Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and garnering praise from then-President Barack Obama (who has been criticized for calling her ” most beautiful attorney general ”).
Emhoff was successful on his own, a partner at DLA Piper law firm. His former clients have amusingly included the advertising agency behind Chihuahua Taco Bell and, less amusingly, a club owner accused of sexual violence and a business that sold AK-47s. Divorced since 2009, he had two children, Cole and Ella, then teenagers.
He must have known from the start that a relationship with his state’s attorney general would lead to scrutiny of his personal and professional life. But according to his account, he was thoroughly.
“I didn’t want it to end,” he told CNN of their first date. “And so the next morning, I decided to email her with my availability for the next four months, including long weekends.”
The two got married in 2014 and would have been very happy. “Doug and Kamala together are almost cute and guilty,” Cole Emhoff recently told The New York Times. “I’m like, ‘When is this going to go away?'”
They are also a different kind of political couple from the Obamas, the Bushes or the Clintons, who all married relatively young while the men in question were still building their political careers. (Donald and Melania Trump married when she was 35 and he was a 59-year-old reality TV host.)
The Standards Change: Michelle and Barack Obama met while she was his mentor at a law firm, and she maintained her own highly successful career for many years, only quitting when her husband entered the House White. Hillary Clinton, of course, became a senator and secretary of state after her husband’s presidency. Still, politicians’ family life is expected to follow some sort of 1950s pattern – early marriage, 2.5 children, everyone supporting the politician’s career. And usually that politician is a dad.
Harris and Emhoff, on the other hand, were both around 50 when they tied the knot. Harris had no children. They formed a blended family, with children who now call her “Momala”. The two spouses kept their respective surnames.
“It’s a snapshot of America,” Jalalzai said. “We are not all alike.”
Now Emhoff could be a new role model for men
And for Emhoff, being married to Harris means taking a step back so his wife can shine. He took time off from DLA Piper in August, to help with the campaign and, presumably, to avoid conflict of interest issues. He left the firm in November and announced he would teach at Georgetown Law School this spring. This will make two teachers in the executive branch, as Jill Biden said she will continue her career in education as first lady.
And while Jill Biden breaks down some barriers by keeping her job as the former first ladies quit theirs, Emhoff is also breaking new ground by reducing his career for that of his wife.
In his GQ essay, he specifies that his campaign for the vice presidency was a team effort in which he was happy to play his part. “It quickly became clear that it was not just about my love for my wife, but also my love for this country,” he writes. “Taking a step back from my career as an entertainment lawyer was a decision we made together – it was something bigger than either of us.”
He would have thrown himself into the countryside, becoming a major asset for his ability to adapt to a variety of environments. “Of all the people, Doug was born randomly for this,” Cole Emhoff told The Times.
And while Emhoff and Harris might be a team, she’s the one who just became vice president – and he’s been grateful of her supporting status. This extends to the jokes about his title. “Look at where we are now,” he said in September. “It’s going to be a lot of work for President Biden, Vice President Harris, First Lady Jill Biden and whatever my title is, Douglas Emhoff.
Since announcing that he would use the title of second gentleman, he’s convinced that “first second gentleman” doesn’t exactly roll his tongue. “You can call me Doug,” he reassured CBS Sunday morningJane Pauley in a recent interview.
And rather than in any way disparaging the contributions of the second ladies who came before him, he took the time to learn more about them, visiting the Library of Congress to research second wives from the past.
Emhoff said he hopes his time in the role will be a role model for his family and the country. He wants his children “to grow up in a world where it’s not news that a loving partner – regardless of gender – supports them in everything they do,” he wrote to GQ. And, he concluded, “I might be the first Second Gentleman, but I know I won’t be the last.
Harris and Emhoff’s marriage challenges not only the stereotype that a woman should take on a supporting role for her husband, but the idea that a person in a marriage should dominate in the pursuit of his career, Jalalzai said. . Of course, Harris continues to be in the spotlight, now as vice president, but her marriage seems like a partnership of equals. This was also true of the Obamas to a large extent, Jalalzai noted, but “in the past four years we haven’t had this kind of healthy relationship modeled” in the executive branch.
Only time will tell how well Emhoff occupies his new position. If we’ve learned anything from previous administrations, it’s that we don’t always know what’s going on in the private lives of public figures. But for now, he and Harris are setting a new standard.
America still grapples with the assumption that it’s emasculating for men to be around powerful women – even the jokes about Bill Clinton potentially becoming “the first guy” in 2016 testify to this fact. Emhoff, at the very least, shows the whole country what it is like to be a man dating a female attorney general and, far from being scared, sends him his calendar for the next four months. By defining the role of the second gentleman, he got off to a good start.
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