Meet Laphonza Butler, the EMILY's List president and Kamala Harris ally entering the Senate

WASHINGTON — Laphonza Butler was a young organizer learning her way around California politics when she met Kamala Harris, then district attorney of San Francisco.

Butler, who was 30 at the time, had recently moved to Los Angeles from the East Coast to oversee a large union of long-term care and assisted living workers. Harris, more than a decade her senior, was running for state attorney general.

But over time, the two Black women − both of whom attended historically Black universities − would form a close relationship. They bonded over how to advance the economic security and well-being of women.

"I would always call her for advice. She would always call me for advice," 44-year-old Butler told USA TODAY in a 2022 interview.

Now, the women have something else to talk about: Butler's appointment to fill the U.S. Senate seat that Dianne Feinstein held until her death last week.

California Senate appointment

Before becoming vice president, Harris served alongside Feinstein for four years as California's junior senator. Butler will now join the U.S. Senate until the 2024 election is held to fill the seat that Feinstein had already announced she was retiring from.

Several sitting Democratic lawmakers are already competing. Reps. Barbara Lee, Adam Schiff and Katie Porter have been in the race, which is expected to be expensive and bruising, for more than six months.

Under the state's jungle primary system, the top two vote getters will advance to the general, regardless of political party. The seat is expected to remain in Democratic hands.

It is unclear Butler she plans to compete for the seat that California Gov. Gavin Newsom appointed her to fill.

Butler is a current resident of Maryland. A spokesman said she owns a home in View Park, California and a place in LA where she will reside. She has already re-registered to vote in the state.

“This week Laphonza is focused on respecting and honoring Sen. Feinstein’s legacy and getting ready to serve the people of California in the Senate. Politics can wait," Matthew Wing, a spokesman for Butler, said in a statement.

A longtime organizer with union roots

Butler was in her twenties, organizing food service workers and janitors, when she left for California. The move to SEIU 2015 was a big step for Butler, who did not have experience leading a union chapter.

She consolidated membership of the local to turn it into the largest union in California and the largest union of home health workers. The changes ruffled some other union organizers, as she quickly became a powerful force within the SEIU.

She stayed with the union for nearly a decade, leaving to become a partner at the firm that advised Harris in her 2019 presidential bid. Butler served as a senior adviser on the campaign that ended with Harris quitting the race before any of the contests were held.

Work as EMILY's List abortion rights advocate

Butler left politics to advise Airbnb before becoming the first woman of color to serve as president of EMILY's List nearly two years ago in September of 2021. The organization works to elect Democratic, pro-abortion rights women.

She became a leading voice in the progressive movement against the Supreme Court's ruling in the Dobbs case and GOP-backed laws that curb abortion access in individual states.

The Republican Party "has been working to chip away at a woman's right to make decisions about her own body and the freedom to decide when she wants to have a family," Butler told USA TODAY after the Supreme Court opinion leaked.

In the position she helped organize a political rally with other abortion rights groups in support of President Joe Biden and Vice President Harris on the day that the pair announced their reelection bid in April.

First Black LGBTQ+ person to represent California in Senate

Butler will be the first openly LGBTQ+ person to represent California in the Senate and the first Black lesbian to openly serve in Congress.

Butler and her partner, Neneki Lee, share a daughter, Nylah.

Newsom noted she will be only the second Black woman to represent the state in the Senate in a Monday email to supporters that said Butler "follows in the footsteps of Vice President Kamala Harris."

The work that the friends have done together in the past provides some clues as to what Butler may do as a senator. She said in a previous interivew that Harris worked with her to make sure background checks would be provided fairly and equitably to home care workers, who are predominately women and women of color.

She also praised Harris for "the impact that she has on young people who are trying to find your own pathway to leadership," saying it is an important voice that Harris brings to the administration, and talked up the vice president's focus on Black maternal health.

Relationships with women senators

In working to elect Democratic women as the head of EMILY's List, Butler has already established relationships with several of her new female colleagues.

Sen. Maggie Hassan, whose reelection she campaigned for last year in New Hampshire, said in a post on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, "I know how fierce of a champion you are for a woman's fundamental freedom in particular, and I look forward to working with you to deliver results for the American people."

Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., the current chair of the Appropriations Committee and the first woman to chair both the Veterans Affairs and Budget panels, said on social media that she was "thrilled to welcome such a strong champion of women’s rights, labor, and reproductive freedom to the U.S. Senate" and she was looking forward to working with her on many issues "from protecting abortion rights to making child care more affordable and accessible."

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Who is Laphonza Butler? The new California senator replacing Feinstein