What misinformation has been shared about Kamala Harris?

[July 26, 2024]  By Christina Anagnostopoulos

(Reuters) - Misinformation about Vice President - and now presidential candidate - Kamala Harris that first spread during the 2020 election has been resurfacing after she announced her 2024 bid for the Oval Office.

With Harris' candidacy, Democrats are betting against her missteps as a politician as well as a history of sexism and racism in the U.S., which have been on display in social media misinformation.

Here are some of the most viral online narratives about Harris.

CLAIM

"Kamala Harris is not eligible to be president because she is not a 'natural born citizen'"

WHAT WE KNOW

This is false. Harris was born in Oakland, California, on Oct. 20, 1964, to an Indian mother and a Jamaican father.

False narratives online said she was not eligible to be vice president or president because she is not a "natural-born citizen" if her parents were not U.S. citizens when she was born.

This theory has been criticized by constitutional scholars such as Michael C. Dorf, professor of law at Cornell Law School, who agreed Harris is a natural-born citizen, as set forth in the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

The false narrative received widespread attention after an Aug. 12, 2020, Newsweek opinion article about Harris' eligibility to be vice president. An editor's note later added to the article apologized for its unintended use in the spread of "birtherism" narratives.
 

CLAIM

"Kamala Harris is not Black"

WHAT WE KNOW

This misleading narrative has received high engagement online. "Since when is this Black culture? Kamala Harris is NOT Black," reads an X post with 80,000 likes and 20,000 re-posts. It includes a photo of a young Harris wearing a sari in a family photo.

Kamala Harris was born to an Indian mother and a Black Jamaican father, both immigrants to the United States. Harris herself has long self identified as both Black and South Asian American. The U.S. Census includes people of Jamaican heritage among racial groups considered to be Black.

Photographs of Harris with her mother, Shyamla Gopalan, and with her father, Donald Harris, can be seen here.

CLAIM

"Kamala Harris had an affair with a married man"

WHAT WE KNOW

Posts in 2020 and again this month said Harris dated a married man at the start of her career in the 1990s.

Available media reports show that former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown had a relationship with Kamala Harris in the 1990s, years after he was separated from his wife.

In 1994, Capitol staffers described Harris as "Brown's girlfriend" when he appointed her to the California Medical Assistance Commission, the Los Angeles Times reported.

In a 2019 column in the San Francisco Chronicle titled, "Sure, I dated Kamala Harris. So what?," Brown wrote, "Yes, we dated. It was more than 20 years ago."

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris attends the American Federation of Teachers' 88th national convention in Houston, Texas, U.S. July 25, 2024. REUTERS/Kaylee Greenlee Beal

It is unclear if or when Brown divorced his wife. In 1996, People magazine said Brown had been "estranged" from his wife, Blanche, since 1981. A 2001 Los Angeles Times article said Brown and his wife had been separated for "nearly 20 years."

CLAIM

Video shows Harris rambling and saying, "Today is today, and yesterday was today yesterday"

WHAT WE KNOW

Harris has had her share of viral social media moments, but this statement never happened.

One post on X with 11,000 likes took a jab at her intelligence while sharing a video of the vice president appearing to say, awkwardly, "Today is today, and yesterday was today yesterday. Tomorrow will be today tomorrow, so live today so the future today will be as the past today, as it is tomorrow."

The video is fake, however, edited from a real speech where she said no such thing.

Edited videos and photographs of politicians are nothing new. After the assassination attempt against Donald Trump on July 13, digitally edited photographs that showed Trump and his security detail smiling were shared online saying it was all "staged."

CLAIM

Video clip of Harris calling young people "stupid" is missing context

WHAT WE KNOW

An Instagram video with over 55,000 likes shows a Harris press conference where she says, "What else do we know about this population, 18-24? They are stupid. That is why we put them in dormitories and they have a resident assistant. They make really bad decisions!"

This clip has been stripped of its context.

The full video shows Harris talking about how "Back on Track," a program aimed at reducing recidivism among young people, can help those arrested on low-level charges by having charges dismissed after completing the program (around 16:00).

The wider quote before the snippet shared on social media shows Harris saying: "When I was at Howard University and we were in college, we were 18-24 and you know what we were called? College kids. But when you turn 18 and you're in the system, you are considered an adult, period."

Harris' team declined to comment. Representatives for Brown did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

(Reporting by Christina Anagnostopoulos, Editing by Stephanie Burnett, Christine Soares and Rosalba O'Brien)

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