She has her own clothing line, Phenomenal, that celebrities such as JANE FONDA and SOFÍA VERGARA have helped her promote. After the November election, she co-founded her own production company. She’s a paid speaker represented by Creative Artists Agency. She’s a Stanford and Harvard Law graduate.
But some on the Biden campaign and now the Biden White House think Meena is, well, too ambitious — at least when it comes to leveraging her relationship with her aunt, Vice President KAMALA HARRIS.
After President JOE BIDEN’s relatives appeared to profit off of his status as senator and vice president, the Biden White House is trying to avoid any repeats by establishing firm ethical standards for family members.
"It's the White House's policy that the president's name should not be used in connection with any commercial activities to suggest or in any way, in any way they could reasonably be understood to imply his endorsement or support," Press Secretary JEN PSAKI said Friday.
These standards apply to the vice president, too.
“The Vice President and her family will uphold the highest ethical standards and it’s the White House’s policy that the Vice President's name should not be used in connection with any commercial activities that could reasonably be understood to imply an endorsement or support,” SABRINA SINGH, a spokesperson for the vice president, said in a statement.
But the policy has been trickier to enforce with Meena than some other family members, given how much Kamala’s image is intertwined with her business projects.
After Biden was officially declared the winner last November, transition ethics lawyers informed Meena that she could sell the rest of her Kamala-themed apparel but could not restock the items. Phenomenal’s “Kamala Harris Swimsuit,” “phenomenal Kamala Tank,” and “Kamala T-shirt,” that appeared on the site last fall are no longer sold.
“Kamala and Maya’s Big Idea,” which was published in June 2020 before Biden picked Kamala as vice president, poses further ethical knots. White House officials say that Meena would be prohibited from publishing that book now because it uses Kamala’s name in the title and her likeness on the cover, which is a drawing of a younger Kamala with MAYA HARRIS, Meena’s mother.
The book doesn’t violate the White House’s policies because she published it before Kamala became vice president, they say. It’s not clear if Meena continuing to accept royalties on the book is permitted, however. Asked if she is still accepting royalties, Meena did not comment.
In a statement, she said that “throughout the primary campaign, general election, and thus far in the administration, I have gone above and beyond to uphold legal and ethical standards.”
As Meena tries to follow the letter of the law, some Biden officials have long been worried about her following the spirit of the rules.
Last August, after Biden picked Kamala, Meena pushed the Biden team to sell a shirt in the campaign store that she designed with fellow influencer CLEO WADE. The shirt was emblazoned, “THE FIRST BUT NOT THE LAST,” alongside a picture of a young Kamala.
The Biden campaign acquiesced, but not for long. By Sept. 6, his team had scrubbed Meena’s name off of the campaign shirt, according to Internet Archive screenshots.
“For appearance sake, Meena’s name was removed because we didn’t want to make it seem or appear that she would be benefiting or profiting from the campaign,” a White House official told Transition Playbook. They said neither Meena nor Wade made any money from the shirt.
Since the election, Meena has continued to stoke anxiety in Bidenworld. When she traveled to the inauguration, she flew on a private plane and posted about the trip on her Instagram stories, the hawk-eyed TYLER PAGER noticed.
The White House acknowledged that Meena flew on a plane owned by a donor to Biden’s inaugural committee. The Biden team declined to say who the plane belonged to.
Meena’s latest venture — Phenomenal Productions — is raising more questions.
Meena announced she was starting the production company with BRAD JENKINS, a former Obama White House staffer, weeks after the election. One of her first projects was a two-minute video featuring clips of her aunt, which debuted the day before Inauguration Day.
“We celebrate Kamala Harris, the first woman and first Black American and Asian American to serve as vice president of the United States of America,” the video’s narrator says.
Meena’s company produced the video with the Supermajority Education Fund, a nonprofit devoted to women’s leadership. (An allied super PAC, Supermajority, spent more than $1 million running ads backing Biden and opposing President DONALD TRUMP last year; most of its funding came from a super PAC started by GEORGE SOROS). On YouTube, the ad lists Meena as a producer.
The White House said it did not know if Meena was paid for the ad, or whether her company volunteered its time. If the former, it might violate White House policy. Asked if she was paid by Supermajority, Meena didn’t respond.
