Kamala
Harris’s life as Vice President took a
180-turn in 24 hours from her stumping for
Biden in Provincetown, an LGBTQ+ culture hub
and haven, on Saturday, July 20, to becoming a
potential presidential nominee on Sunday, July
21, when the news broke of Biden leaving the
race. The Biden Victory Fund event at the
Pilgrim Monument and Provincetown Museum
showed enthusiasm about a possible November
win with the Biden-Harris ticket. As the
keynote speaker, Harris was wildly welcomed to
P-town with placards that read “VP-Town!”
Everybody on the Biden team at the event was
on message. However, most attendees hoped
Biden would exit.
So
when the news hit that Kamala Harris was now a
potential presidential nominee for the head of
the ticket, enthusiasm swelled. Both the Black
Caucus and Asian American Caucus immediately
endorsed Harris. Within 30 minutes of her
announcement, One Silicon Valley, a software
engineering consulting firm, raised more than
$1 million.
Also
hours later, a national Zoom call from the
D.C.-based Black women’s organization “WinWithBlackWomen.org” had over 40,000 sistahs in
attendance. In three hours, these women
raised over $1 million to support Harris,
which T.V. personality Star Jones, the
campaign chair, spearheaded.
“WinWithBlackWomen.org” is a national
intergenerational and intersectional
sisterhood of black diasporic women who
leverage talent, influence, and networks to
support Black women.
The
politics of being the first
When
I heard the news of Harris running for
president, I immediately thought about how my
deceased Brooklyn Congresswoman Shirley
Chisholm would be proud of this moment.
Chisholm was the first African American woman
to campaign for the presidential nomination in
1972 on the Democratic ticket. A woman of
temerity and integrity, her slogan was
“Unbought and Unbossed.” Confronted with
racist and sexist opposition, Chisholm lost
the nomination. In 2024, similar concerns
arise for Harris, too.
When
news broke that Kamala was in the race for the
White House, Black Twitter was abuzz with
exuberance and trepidation. “Much of Black
Twitter is on board with Kamala as a
candidate, but unsure if America feels the
same way,” The Root reports.
“Okay, so now it’s Kamala.
Every white person who wanted him to drop
out needs to figure out how to defend a
Black woman in person and online for the
first time in their lives. That’s the job
now. I’d like to see it, but I never have,”
Comedian and podcaster Akilah Hughes wrote
on Twitter.
Prominent
Democratic donor John Morgan of Florida
emphatically stated he would not fundraise for
Harris. “She would not be my first choice,”
Morgan quoted in The Hill. “The donors holding
the 90 million can release those funds in the
morning. It’s all yours. You can keep my
million. And good luck,” he continued.
Striking
the right balance with white Americans -
Republican or Democrat - is difficult in this
polarized era, especially for a woman of color
in power who identifies as black. The “angry
black woman” trope hovers over all sisters of
African descent. Harris is attacked for her
laugh. She runs the risk of being perceived as
too loud, too forceful, not knowing her place,
not staying in her lane, and being arrogant,
albeit she is the V.P.
Must
Harris struggle to avoid the misogynoir trope
when asserting her power and authority? She
mustn’t be a titular head for fear of being
perceived as unqualified, tokenized, or a DEI
hire. Research shows that Harris is one of the
most targeted politicians on the Internet, and
FOX News runs a constant thread of bogus
articles about her.
Job
performance
Harris
struggled to carve out a lane for herself in
her early years, feeling the weight of being
the first Black and Asian American V.P. With a
job performance approval rating no higher than
39 percent from multiple polls, she had to
convince the American public for a second
term.
Republicans
have made Harris the face of Biden’s
unfavorable immigration policy to win
political ground in this election period. The
intersexuality of her race and gender was
weaponized to discredit her ability. It was
unsurprising to women and people of color that
Harris was appointed to fix immigration that
previous administrations couldn’t resolve,
which set her up to fail.
I’m
with her!
Harris’s
blunders were magnified, and her victories
muted. Harris has accomplished a lot since
taking office. Alongside Biden, Harris helped
America get vaccinated, rebuild the economy
due to COVID, led Congress to protect voter’s
rights by building a broad and diverse
coalition, expand workers’ rights to organize
and collectively bargain, and women’s
issues-reproductive justice since the overturn
of Roe v Wade, maternal health, child poverty.
In
her first public speech since her running
announcement, Harris said, “Building up the
middle class will be a defining goal of my
presidency. We here know when our middle class
is strong, America is strong.”
In
one day, Harris garnered more than half the
delegates needed to win the nomination; two
days later, she became the presumptive nominee
with over $100M raised since the announcement.
She has reenergized the base and injected
hope, focusing on working folks like me.
