How Trumpy Conspiracy Nut Revealed Harris’ Husband’s Past Affair

For four years, an obscure election denialist named Mark Mendlovitz tried hawking a story that Doug Emhoff’s first marriage ended because he had an affair. Media outlets, he claimed in an exclusive interview with the Daily Beast, refused to run it.

On Saturday, the Daily Mail broke the story, publishing a piece that alleged the second gentleman cheated on his first wife, Kerstin, with Najen Naylor, a teacher at their children’s school—and got her pregnant.

Shortly after, Emhoff confirmed the accusations of infidelity, but did not address whether the relationship produced a child. Sources said there was no child as a result of the relationship—although it remains unclear whether Emhoff paid the woman for her silence.

(The Harris campaign did not respond to a question about whether Emhoff reached a financial settlement with the woman in question.)

The man behind the story, Mendlovitz, told the Beast the affair was “the worst kept secret in Los Angeles.” He claimed he first heard of the fling from the publisher of Beverly Hills Weekly, Josh Gross. Gross told the Beast he “can’t reveal any sources.”

None of Mendlovitz’s information was firsthand. “I don’t know anything personally,” he explained. “Other than that, I’ve just spoken to lots of people.”

Mendlovitz’s ties also include people close to the best known pro-Trump conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, showing his depth of engagement in the far-right world. His Twitter feed is filled with similar sentiments and tropes:

The Beast has confirmed that Mendlovitz tried to push the story with respected investigative reporters in Washington D.C., but in partial form. The 60-year-old lives in Beverly Hills and describes himself as working at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. His wife is a senior entertainment lawyer, as Emhoff was before his wife became vice president.

Mendlovitz’s only connection to Emhoff and Vice President Kamala Harris is that “I don’t want them to win,” he said. The California resident voted for Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020, and confirmed he plans to do the same come November.

Harris and her husband, Mendlovitz said, “have been portrayed as these wonderful people when Donald Trump has been dragged through the mud.”

“It seems like the press is trying to cheerlead for her candidacy when, in my book, she’s one of the dumbest people in politics, quite honestly,” Mendlovitz continued.

Rumors of Emhoff’s extramarital affair and potential love child were first publicly circulated by far-right internet personality Laura Loomer on July 31. The anti-Muslim activist, who is close to Trump, posted on X, formerly known as Twitter, that she had five unnamed sources tell her “Kamala Harris’s husband Doug Emhoff allegedly got his daughter’s elementary school teacher pregnant while he was still married.”

Loomer also alleged that at least one mainstream news organization had prior knowledge of the story, but that the publication “decided to shelve the story to protect Kamala Harris.” Mendlovitz told the Daily Beast that conservative journalist Patrick Howley told him the same thing in 2020.

Howley, a reporter for Alex Jones’ news blog National File, declined to confirm or deny Mendlovitz’s claim, but claimed that, “Emhoff is the real power broker behind Kamala’s candidacy.” According to him, the allegations went unreported because “powerful men still get protected in D.C.”

Mendlovitz, who self identifies on X as a journalist, theorized that the reporters he approached in 2020 may not have wanted to “do any hard work.” The media, he says, “has been completely unfair with Republicans.”

On X, he says, he has amassed a “devoted following because they know they’re going to hear the truth from me.”