Maya Harris facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Maya Harris
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Harris in 2017
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Maya Lakshmi Harris
January 30, 1967 Urbana-Champaign, Illinois, U.S.
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| Education | University of California, Berkeley (BA) Stanford University (JD) |
| Political party | Democratic |
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| Children | Meena Harris |
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| Relatives | Family of Kamala Harris |
Maya Lakshmi Harris (born January 30, 1967) is an American lawyer, writer, and advocate for public policy. She has worked on important political campaigns and for groups that help people. Maya Harris was a senior advisor for Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign in 2016. She also led the 2020 presidential campaign for her sister, Kamala Harris.
Maya Harris was born in Champaign–Urbana, Illinois. She went to high school in Oakland, California. Later, she studied at the University of California, Berkeley and Stanford University. She has worked with organizations like PolicyLink, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and the Center for American Progress.
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Early Life and Education
Maya Lakshmi Harris was born in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois. She grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area and in Montreal, Canada. Her mother, Shyamala Gopalan Harris, was a breast cancer researcher from India. Her father, Donald Harris, was an economics professor from Jamaica.
Maya and her older sister, Kamala Harris, learned about both Baptist and Hindu beliefs as they grew up. When Maya was 17, she had her daughter, Meena Harris, as a single parent.
Maya Harris earned her first college degree from the University of California, Berkeley in 1989. After that, she went to Stanford Law School. While at Stanford, she was an editor for the Stanford Law Review. She also helped with a legal project that assisted the community. She earned her law degree in 1992 with high honors.
Career Highlights
Working as a Lawyer
After finishing law school, Maya Harris worked for a judge in California. In 1994, she joined a law firm in San Francisco. She worked on different types of legal cases there.
Harris also taught law at several universities. She taught at the University of San Francisco School of Law and University of California, Hastings College of the Law. She even became the dean of the Lincoln Law School of San Jose. At 29, she was one of the youngest law school deans in the United States. She was also the only Indian woman to be a law school dean at that time.
Advocacy and Public Service
Maya Harris worked at PolicyLink, a group that helps improve economic and social fairness. She helped organize meetings about how police and communities can work better together. She also wrote reports about police reform.
She served as the executive director of the Northern California American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). This made her the first Jamaican American and the first South Asian person to lead an ACLU office. In this role, she managed legal cases, worked with the media, and helped with community organizing. She focused on making the justice system fairer and improving education for everyone.
In 2003, Harris led a successful campaign to stop a law in California. This law would have prevented state groups from collecting information about people's race and ethnicity. In 2006, she was the main lawyer in a case that helped over 100,000 Californians in jail get their voting rights back.
Supporting Important Causes
In 2008, Maya Harris became a vice president at the Ford Foundation. This foundation gives money to groups that work on important issues around the world. She led a team that supported good government, helped people participate in democracy, and protected human rights. Her team gave out over $150 million each year.
In Politics
From 2008 to 2013, Harris worked at the Ford Foundation. Before that, she led the Northern California ACLU. She was also a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress. She was a visiting scholar at Harvard Law School. From 2017 to 2018, she was a political and legal expert for MSNBC, a news channel.
Maya Harris helped write the Democratic Party's plan for 2016 when she represented Hillary Clinton's campaign. She also led her sister Kamala Harris's presidential campaign in 2020 until it ended.
Writing and Publications
Maya Harris has written many articles and reports. In 2006, she wrote an essay called "Fostering Accountable Community-Centered Policing." This essay was part of a book called The Covenant with Black America. She also wrote about the difference in pay between men and women in another report.
She has written guides on how communities can work with police to make changes. She also wrote about voting rights in California in 2008. In 2014, she wrote about the growing power of women of color in American elections.
In 2020, Maya Harris wrote in The Atlantic and Women's Health Magazine about living with lupus. She was diagnosed with this long-term illness when she was 22 years old.
Awards and Recognition
Maya Harris has received many awards for her work.
- In 1997, she won the Junius W. Williams Young Lawyer of the Year Award.
- In 1998, she was named one of the Top 20 Up and Coming Lawyers Under 40 by the San Francisco Daily Journal.
- In 2006, she was recognized as one of ten notable "Desis" (people of South Asian descent) of the year.
- In 2008, she received the Women Who Dare Award from Girls, Inc.
- In 2009, she was included in The Root 100, which celebrates African-American leaders.
- In 2014, she received the Champion of Justice Award for her work on gender equality.
Personal Life
Maya Harris has a daughter named Meena Harris, who was born in 1984. Maya has been married to Tony West since July 1998. Maya and Tony met at Stanford Law School, where they both graduated in 1992. They became friends there and started their relationship after finishing school.
Her daughter, Meena, graduated from Stanford in 2006 and from Harvard Law School in 2012. Maya's sister, Kamala Harris, served as the Vice President of the United States from 2021 to 2025. Kamala Harris also ran for president in 2024 but was not successful.
