Alex Padilla is close to Kamala Harris. What does that mean if she’s elected president?

It wasn’t hard for Alex Padilla to bond with Kamala Harris when they were both up and coming officeholders in Sacramento.

“We’re both children of immigrant parents who had to really work hard not just to succeed academically and professionally,” said Padilla, who now holds the Senate seat Harris left in 2021 to become vice president.

“We know how much our parents struggled to create opportunities for us,” he added. “We owe much to this country.”

Padilla is considered one of the closest California allies Harris has. When he calls her, she routinely answers, “Hello, friend.” His son Diego, who’s now 10, still has the stuffed giraffe she sent when he was born.

A Harris win would make Padilla a special sort of Washington player.

“Senator Padilla could succeed Chris Coons as the Senate’s president whisperer,” said John Pitney, professor of American government at Claremont McKenna College. Coons, the U.S. senator from Delaware who holds the seat once held by President Joe Biden and remains close to the president.

“The perception that he has the president’s ear could give him additional clout with his colleagues,” said Pitney of Padilla.

The senator addressed the California delegation meeting Wednesday and will be speaking at the convention on Thursday before Harris gives her acceptance speech as the Democratic presidential candidate — a plum spot on what’s usually a convention’s most-watched night.

Children of immigrants

He and Harris share somewhat common backgrounds, and their views on key issues are largely aligned–and frequent targets of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump.

Padilla is the son of Mexican immigrants. He grew up in the San Fernando Valley. His Senate biography says he was drawn to politics “ in response to California’s anti-immigrant Proposition 187.”

Prop 187 was a successful 1994 ballot initiative that barred undocumented immigrants from receiving certain public services, such as health care and education.

Padilla, 51, was elected to the Los Angeles City Council in 1999, the state Senate in 2006 and secretary of state in 2014, where he oversaw elections and voting rights issues.

Harris, 59, is the daughter of a Jamaican father and a mother from India. An Oakland native, Harris was raised mostly by her mother, she worked as a prosecutor after graduating law school in 1989. She was elected San Francisco district attorney in 2003, state attorney general in 2010 and U.S. senator in 2016.

Harris and Padilla met when he was the Los Angeles City Council president and she was in the district attorney’s office. They worked together later when, as a state senator, Harris as attorney general helped him push stronger consumer protections for mortgage holders.

Padilla liked her views on issues important to him. They had nuanced views on immigration, urging compassion and tolerance.

The senator told an Axios forum this week Harris’ views were “thoughtful,” adding she feels “We can’t forget Dreamers, farmworkers, other long-term undocumented immigrants,”

He also likes her approach to easing crime. Harris has been criticized first for being too tough on crime during her attorney general years, then not tough enough as a senator when she championed criminal justice reforms.

“Kamala Harris likes to clam she has solved crime—it’s a complete and total lie,” the Trump campaign said in a statement Tuesday..

But Padilla sees consistency in her approach. “From the beginning, she’s made it a point to say for all the people to be tough on crime, it’s more prudent to be smart on crime. That may be a little unorthodox for many who have been hearing about tough on crime for decades.

“Where you’re smarter on crime, with emphasis on prevention and early intervention,” he said.

Harris wrote a book, “Smart on Crime,” in 2009 that urged tough penalties for serious offenders, but a softer approach to those who committed lower-level crimes, including help with job training and education.

Can Harris win?

But can Harris win the White House? Her campaign for the 2020 presidential nomination was a disaster, ending before the election year had begun.

“As time goes on, we all learn,” Padilla said.

“While the campaign in 2019 may not have done as she initially liked, she’s been every success of the Biden-Harris administration,” he said.

“Every time I’ve been to White House and Roosevelt room to discuss infrastructure, the supreme court, chips and science, she’s been right next to the president at every negotiation,” Padilla said.

Will all that mean she’s going to win?

“This cycle has been different from what we’ve always been used to. History will be made in November one way or another,” he said. Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump was convicted in May of 34 felony counts involving falsifying business records.

Padilla sums up the election this way: “We’ll either elect the first woman or people will vote for the convicted felon.”