Twenty things you probably didn’t know about Kamala Harris

2. Harris strongly supports “familial DNA searching,ˮ in which police take DNA samples from crime scenes and compare them to existing databases to look for not just any direct matches in criminal databases, but any familial matches. Police have gradually expanded the practice’s reach, from checking DNA collected against existing samples of convicted criminals to checking them against samples in the databases of genealogy web sites and genetic-testing companies like 23andMe and Ancestry.com. California allows the collection and preservation of DNA samples from anyone who is arrested, even if they’re not charged with a crime.

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3. Harris also has been a strong advocate of civil asset forfeiture. She supported a bill in California that would have allowed prosecutors to seize assets before initiating criminal proceedings — a power now available only at the federal level — if there were a “substantial probability” they would eventually initiate such proceedings. Besides cases involving violent crimes, the legislation allowed seizures in cases involving such crimes as bribery, gambling, and trafficking endangered species. Harris endorsed the bill after then-attorney general Eric Holder sharply limited civil asset forfeiture among federal prosecutors. She argued that the practice gave local and state law-enforcement officials “more tools to target the illicit profits [of transnational criminal groups] and dismantle these dangerous organizations.”

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