Is America ready for its first-ever First Gentleman?

WASHINGTON (AFP): If Kamala Harris wins the US presidential election she will make history — and so will her husband Doug Emhoff.

The ebullient 59-year-old lawyer will be the first-ever First Gentleman if Harris, succeeds in becoming the first woman president in the United States’ nearly two-and-a-half-century existence.

Emhoff has already got used to blazing something of a trail of his own alongside his trailblazing wife, who’s also 59.

He has leaned into his role as the first Second Gentleman, proving an energetic campaigner and fierce defender of Harris in her initially bumpy tenure as the first female, Black and South Asian vice president.

In yet another milestone, Emhoff is also the first Jewish spouse of an American president or vice president, taking a very visible role in President Joe Biden’s administration combating anti-Semitism.

He is now enthusiastic about the prospect of following in the footsteps of famous Democratic first spouses, like Jackie Kennedy, Michelle Obama and Jill Biden — but as the first man to hold the role.

Where he doesn’t have a record is in being the first prospective First Gentleman, a title claimed by former president Bill Clinton during his wife Hillary Clinton’s failed 2016 run.

“I’m honored now to have my wife be at the top of the ticket,” he told a podcast recently.

The sudden change in Harris’s fortunes caught Emhoff short. He said that when Joe Biden dropped out of the race he was in the gym with his phone off — leading to a flood of missed texts and calls, including from Harris.

“Never leaving my phone in the car again,” he said on X.

The swift swap in the Democratic ticket has raised questions about whether America is ready to overcome racism and sexism to choose a Black woman president — but Emhoff would be a paradigm shift too.

Republicans are already attacking him, based partly on race.

Harris’s campaign on Tuesday slammed “Trump’s despicable attack against the Second Gentleman” after Trump nodded along while an interviewer said Emhoff was a “crappy Jew.” Trump himself then said that Harris “doesn’t like Jewish people.”

Yet Emhoff has long shown he can give as good as he gets.

“Mr Trump, I know you have so much trouble pronouncing her name,” Emhoff said in a recent video, referring to Trump’s habit of mispronouncing Kamala. “After the election, you can just call her Madam President.”

An entertainment lawyer, Emhoff met then-California Attorney General Harris on a blind date in 2013 and they married a year later.

That made Harris a stepmother to Emhoff’s then-teenage son and daughter from his previous marriage, Cole and Ella. Famously, they dubbed her “Momala”.

In 2020 he took a leave of absence from his law firm to campaign for Harris in her first presidential bid, and then in January 2021 officially became Second Gentleman.

Emhoff admits the transition wasn’t easy, with some of the “toughest moments” caused by “leaving the career that I loved.”

“It was always the president (Biden) who came up to me and said, ‘Look, I know, I know, kid. You’re a great lawyer. I know this must have been tough,'” Emhoff told campaign staff last week.

Since then he’s taken a high-profile role in the Biden administration, particularly in a series of speeches calling out anti-Semitism after the October 7 attacks by Hamas on Israel.

At the same time Harris has been vocal in urging Israel to ease the suffering in Gaza, meaning that as a couple they have effectively bridged a deep divide in the Democratic Party.

Since Biden dropped out, Emhoff has gone even more public. He will lead the US delegation to the closing of the Paris Olympics and is filling in for Jill Biden at a fundraiser in coming days.

He’s also been a hit on social media, with a picture of a 20-year-old Emhoff with a full head of hair going viral.

On the downside are the growing Republican attacks.

They include sexist criticism of Harris for not having her own biological children, in apparent revenge after Trump’s running mate J.D. Vance came under fire for comments about “childless cat ladies.”

Emhoff said Vance’s comments were “abhorrent” and “stupid.”

In an unusual show of support, Emhoff’s ex-wife Kerstin Emhoff defended the “loving, nurturing” Harris against the “baseless attacks.”