Outgoing Vice President Kamala Harris will leave Washington, D.C., on Jan. 20, holding no political office, but she could follow the lead of some other former veeps and run again.
While most vice presidents who have run for president either succeeded and served their term, or lost and left public office, there were others who had different second acts once they left the Naval Observatory.
Harris, who served as a senator representing California before being elected vice president, has reportedly considered a run for governor in California in 2026 or another run for president in 2028 after she leaves the vice presidency. If she does run for another office after leaving the vice presidency, she would not be the first one to do so.
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Here are some of the others who ran for another office after ending their term.
Richard Nixon
Nixon served in the House and represented California in the Senate before he was elected vice president in 1952, serving under Presented Dwight Eisenhower. He was reelected alongside Eisenhower in 1956. Nixon ran for president in 1960, facing off and ultimately losing to Democrat John F. Kennedy.
After Nixon left the vice presidency in 1961, he ran for governor of California in the 1962 election. He faced incumbent Gov. Pat Brown (D-CA) and lost by roughly by roughly 5%, two years after beating Kennedy in the presidential contest in the Golden State, 50.1%-49.6%.
At his “last press conference” after losing the gubernatorial race, the former vice president said that the press wouldn’t “have Nixon to kick around anymore.” Despite his vow that the November 1962 press conference would be his last, Nixon would seek office again.
Nixon ran for president in 1968 and won over Democrat Hubert Humphrey, marking one of the most unlikely comebacks in modern political history.
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Hubert Humphrey
Humphrey served as mayor of Minneapolis before representing Minnesota in the Senate from 1949 until 1964. He would serve as vice president under President Lyndon Johnson from 1965 until 1969.
While serving as vice president, Humphrey was nominated as the Democratic Party’s pick for president in 1968 following a turbulent process set off by Johnson declining to run for reelection. Humphrey would lose to Nixon in the presidential election, but would not be out of public office for long.
In 1970, Humphrey would run for and win a seat in the Senate representing Minnesota. The seat he won was not the one he vacated in 1964, but rather was the one held by retiring Sen. Eugene McCarthy (D-MN). While a senator he ran for president again in 1972, but failed to win the Democratic nomination.
Levi Morton
Morton served as vice president under President Benjamin Harrison from 1889 until 1893, but would not be Harrison’s running mate in the 1892 election. Morton left the vice presidency after only one term, and Harrison left the presidency too after losing his reelection bid, in March 1893.
Morton, who had served in the House of Representatives and been a Minister to France prior to being vice president, ran for governor in New York in 1894. He won the election and served as governor for one two-year term, only two years after leaving the vice presidency.
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While these former vice presidents ran for other offices after serving their term, recent vice presidents have either attempted presidential bids or not run for anything.
Former Vice President Mike Pence unsuccessfully ran for the GOP nomination for president in 2024, former Vice President Joe Biden won the presidency in 2020 after four years out of office, and former Vice President Dick Cheney did not run for another office after ending his term in 2009.
