Doug Emhoff made his first guest appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live Yesterday, I took the opportunity to respond to Donald Trump's many attacks on his wife, Kamala Harris.
Host Jimmy Kimmel jokingly asked Emhoff, “What was your reaction when your wife turned black? Were you surprised?”
“All of this stuff, you know, is just a distraction,” Emhoff replied. “We can joke about it, but it’s really a distraction, so all of the insults, all of the things that are directed at her, at me, at our family, are really a distraction from what they’re trying to do.”
Harris’s presidential campaign has completely changed their lives, Emhoff told Kimmel. “It’s like being shot out of a cannon,” he said. “That day when she got the call, of course I was stuck here in Los Angeles and didn’t hear from her for 30 or 40 minutes, and from that point on it was just hustle and bustle and hustle and bustle.” He added that there is “almost no happy time for the couple” because Harris is focused on winning the election.
Elsewhere in the 15-minute interview, Emhoff talked about growing up in Los Angeles, working at McDonald’s in high school, and what it was like to be the second-in-command of the country. He stressed that he was not part of Harris’ debate preparations or her selection of Tim Walz as her running mate.
“The last thing I would do is give her advice on something she’s really good at,” he told Kimmel. “If she asks me something, I’ll tell her what I think, but we really try to keep it separate because we really want to be there for each other, our family, our kids, all of that stuff.”
Emhoff said he expected Harris to win the upcoming debate without a hitch. “As she was getting ready for the debate, someone asked me, ‘Well, how did it feel to debate her? You’re both trial lawyers. Have you ever debated?’” he said. “I said, ‘No, I’ve never won.’ So I’m looking forward to this debate.”
Emhoff also spoke about his role as a gentleman, becoming an advocate for gender equality and standing up against the rise of anti-Semitism. “I was a lawyer in Hollywood. I was an entertainment lawyer here in this community for 30 years. I loved every minute of it, and it was a little bit difficult to go from that to being on the Biden-Harris ticket and spending all this time getting them elected. And then it was like, ‘Well, what do you do now?’”
Harris and Trump are scheduled to hold their first debate in Philadelphia on September 10. The debate will be broadcast on ABC News.
