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The 32nd and current Attorney General of California, Kamala Devi Harris, has become engaged to Los Angeles lawyer Douglas Emhoff. The two met on a blind date arranged by a close friend of Harris and had been seeing each other for about a year before they decided to take things forward with a formal engagement.
Emhoff, listed as Partner-in-Charge of Venable LLP , is said to have proposed to Harris by dropping to one knee on March 27 in her South of Market apartment. Harris, in her typically low-key manner is sporting a simple round diamond and platinum engagement ring. She describes Emhoff as an “incredibly smart” person with “the best sense of humor.”
She is known for her strong stands on public issues including her unwavering support of homeowners who were victims of the subprime mortgage mess, and her refusal to defend the state’s same-sex marriage ban.
Harris, who had earlier dated Democratic Party politician Willie Lewis Brown Jr., made headlines recently when she chided President Obama for commenting that she “happens to be, by far, the best looking attorney general in the country.”
Even though, at the same fundraising speech, Obama appreciated Harris’s work saying, “she is brilliant and she is dedicated and she is tough, and she is exactly what you’d want in anybody who is administering the law, and making sure that everybody is getting a fair shake,” he did have to tender an apology for that “best looking” comment.
White House press secretary Jay Carney said later the President was clear on the issue, and “He fully recognizes the challenges women continue to face in the workplace and that they should not be judged based on appearance.”
Although the couple hasn’t yet set a marriage date, it’s expected to be an intimate event within the next six months. “I don’t believe in long engagements,” Harris told the media.