Kamala Harris' Stepdaughter Ella Emhoff Has Faced Some Tragedies

The press is fascinated by Kamala Harris' stepdaughter, Ella Emhoff, who is a fashion designer and model. She first captured the media's attention with her head-turning fashion at the presidential inauguration in 2021, but her lavish life is not as charmed as it seems. Emhoff deals with persistent pain, thanks to a spinal condition she was born with. She took to Instagram in August 2024 to ask her followers for their best tips and treatments for chronic pain. "I was born with a tethered spine," Emhoff wrote in her Stories (via Newsweek). "[I] was in and out of doctors and PT for most of my adolescence. Got lower back surgery, grew a million inches, and now deal with chronic pain." 

According to Cleveland Clinic, having a tethered spine means there's a malformation where the spinal canal and spinal cord meet. This is a condition you're born with which worsens as you age, since the stretching of the spinal cord eventually starts to inhibit blood flow, leading to unpleasant symptoms like muscle weakness, numbness, and loss of motor skills. This is likely why Emhoff had surgery as a child, but clearly, she's dealing with some long-term side effects. 

Aside from trying to manage her chronic pain, Emhoff has also had to contend with her stepmother's political career, which brought with it a slew of challenges Emhoff probably never thought she would have to face, especially after Biden dropped out of the 2024 presidential race and endorsed Harris. This upended Emhoff's life even more. 

When Ella Emhoff's stepmother, Kamala Harris, became the first female vice president of the United States, Emhoff's life changed irrevocably. Suddenly, she could no longer poke her head out the door without Secret Service agents following her around. Her new normal became apparent to the public as Emhoff continued to attend high-profile events, like New York Fashion Week and the Met Gala, with her security detail in tow. While one can stomach the idea of the Secret Service accompanying you to big, public events, it must be a little (read: very) annoying when they have to join you on dates. This, too, is Emhoff's reality. Whenever she and her boyfriend, Samuel Hine, leave the confines of their house, the Secret Service follows. 

Sometimes, Emhoff can't even enjoy a peaceful lunch with friends without it turning into a national security debacle. She made headlines when an anti-police watcher got into a scuffle with her Secret Service agents outside of a restaurant where she and a friend were meeting up. The perpetrator, Harry Heymann, confronted Emhoff's Secret Service detail before he started vandalizing their vehicles. The New York Police Department was called to the scene, but due to an abundance of caution, Emhoff was immediately evacuated from the restaurant. 

A Secret Service spokesperson later addressed the incident, explaining that Heymann was arrested on the scene. "At no point was any protectee in danger as a result of this incident," the spokesperson said (via the New York Post). Still, getting ushered out of a restaurant like your life is in danger can't exactly be a pleasant experience. 

When Kamala Harris was selected as the Democratic presidential nominee, Ella Emhoff found herself having to navigate increased media attention. She has since had to deal with intense criticism, which ranged from her fashion choices to her relationship with her father, Dough Emhoff. 

Ella Emhoff gave us a bit of whiplash (the good kind) with her style U-turn at the 2024 DNC, proving that she can pull off just about any outfit, but some disgruntled folks thought her outfit choices were inappropriate for such a renowned political event and that she should have covered up her tattoos. "Tattoos on women are generally disgusting," right-wing political commentator Richard Hanania wrote on X, formerly Twitter. He also called Emhoff "the nightmare scenario for most people with a daughter." Another brutal tweet from a critic read: "Ella Emhoff is disgusting, and I don't care how that sounds to anyone else! ... President Trump's family would never appear at a national Republican Convention dressed like Emhoff has."

Aside from having her outfit choices critiqued, Emhoff also had to contend with some right-wingers trashing her relationship with her father, Doug Emhoff. Some conservatives went wild over a candid snap of Emhoff standing at her father's side with his arm around her. It was a normal, father-daughter moment, but according to some Republicans, it was wildly inappropriate. "Totally not weird," right-leaning political activist Charlie Kirk wrote on X, next to the picture of Emhoff and her dad. "What the hell is wrong with hugging your child?" one person tweeted in response to the criticism. Others flooded Kirk's comments with pictures and videos of actual strange and inappropriate moments between Donald Trump and his daughter, Ivanka Trump, which conservatives seemed happy to ignore while criticizing a perfectly normal picture of Emhoff and her father.