ROYAL OAK, Mich. — At a recent forum at a small community theater in suburban Detroit, Vice President Kamala Harris was asked to talk about her life for the benefit of voters still getting to know her.

This was the kind of question usually asked of a new candidate. But Harris was getting it less than two weeks before the Nov. 5 election and after millions of people had voted. His response perhaps underlined the defining challenge of his campaign for the White House.

Harris asked, “How much time do we have?” he joked.

The truth is, not much.

Any candidate’s most valuable resource is time, and Harris has been historically limited from the start. The Democratic nominee has been running for just three months after Democratic President Joe Biden dropped out of the race, and Harris still faces voters who say they want to know more about who she is or how she will govern.

Her public events have gravitated towards large rallies, where crowds erupt with enthusiasm and Harris delivers variations of her standard stump speech. But last week, it added events in more intimate settings, simpler church services and black box theater meetings where conversations can be more revealing.

“I’ve lived a full life,” Harris told the audience in Michigan. “I am a wife, I am a mother, I am a sister, I am a godmother. I love cooking.

Harris, 60, is a relative newcomer to the national political scene.

As he often reminded voters, most of his career was spent outside Washington, as a prosecutor and state attorney general in California. That was followed by a four-year tenure in the Senate and a flare-up in the 2020 White House race. His time as vice president raised his profile, but it wasn’t anything a traditional candidate would have at this stage of the race.

“By comparison, Harris is still a relatively unknown candidate,” said Kevin Madden, a political strategist who has worked on three presidential campaigns. “It takes years to build the kind of national profile that can withstand the brutality of an attacker in a presidential campaign.”

Biden ran several times before winning the nomination and had three decades of public service on his resume, including eight years as vice president. Democrat Barack Obama began building his profile during John Kerry’s 2004 presidential campaign and the 2006 midterm elections, before his two-year quest for what would be his first term in the White House. On the Republican side, the Bush family’s brand was built through multiple presidential campaigns over two decades.

“Creating and executing a Harris-specific presidential campaign in 108 days was always going to be a big, big challenge,” Madden said.

Meanwhile, Republican Donald Trump is a known quantity. He had near-universal name recognition even before the 2016 campaign due to his time on reality television. He has been campaigning essentially since losing the 2020 election to Biden, a fact he refuses to accept to this day.

The shortened campaign presented advantages and challenges for Harris and her aides. But since there’s no way to change the reality of this political timeline, they can only try to make the best of it.

This leads to an endless series of difficult choices: where to go, what to talk about, who to talk to. These challenges arise in the final weeks of every campaign, but for Harris they have been a central feature of her sprint.

Aides framed the campaign in different stages.

In the opening days, Harris prioritized clinching the nomination and thwarting potential rivals. He then tried to introduce himself to the public on his own terms. This meant talking about his biography but also his philosophy of management, especially on economic matters; because potential voters were complaining that they didn’t know what he was about.

In the meantime, he returned to Washington for assignments related to his mission; He sought to use the government’s proficiency in responding to natural disasters and demonstrate its proficiency in national security in upcoming overseas wars.

“Because of the discontinuous nature of the race, it’s a little steeper of a hill for him to climb, but that’s why he’s doing everything he can,” said Eric Schultz, who served as deputy White House press secretary under Obama.

In recent weeks, Harris has been more open about the summer Sunday when Biden dropped out of the race and handed her the keys to the campaign. He offered voters a new perspective on his faith to turn a profound political moment into an opportunity to connect with voters.

“Sunday was an extraordinary day when the president called me, and I instinctively understood the solemnity, the solemnity of that moment,” he said during a CNN town hall.

That’s why he called his pastor, he said. “I needed this spiritual connection, I needed this advice, I needed prayer.” He added that he prayed every day.

The event, held in suburban Detroit, was one of three in key Midwestern states last week where Harris, joined by Liz Cheney, a leading Republican critic of Trump, answered questions from a moderator and undecided voters. He was a different version of the vice president than the one seen at his rallies, more relaxed and talkative.

Rita Peterson, 48, said she was impressed by Harris’ ability to connect.

“I think when you come from a place of joy and a place of wanting to work together to move forward, there are a lot of people who want to be a part of it and want to move forward together.” he said.

The talks with Cheney were intended to appeal to Republican voters who are worried about a second Trump presidency, especially after Trump’s failed attempt to overturn the 2020 election and the violent insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, which resulted in Trump’s election as president. Supporters beat law enforcement officers and shed their blood to stop the certification of Biden’s victory.

Harris is focusing on creating a contrast with Trump in the final days of her campaign. He will return to the area near the White House where Trump helped incite the mob on Jan. 6, hoping it will clarify for voters the struggle between defending democracy and sowing political chaos.

On Tuesday — a week before Election Day — he will deliver a speech at the Ellipse calling on the nation to “turn the page.”