Kamala Harris’ Victory for Women

When Joe Biden is sworn in as the 46th U.S. president on Jan. 20, 2021, Sen. Kamala Harris will become his vice president. As “Madam Vice President,” she will be the first female, first Black and first South Asian American to hold that position.

“This election is about so much more than @JoeBiden or me,” Harris said on Twitter. “It’s about the soul of America and our willingness to fight for it. We have a lot of work ahead of us. Let’s get started.”

We did it, @JoeBiden. pic.twitter.com/oCgeylsjB4

— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) November 7, 2020

On late Saturday morning after learning of their win as the next president and vice president of the United States, she called Biden over the phone to say, “We did it, we did it, Joe. You’re going to be the next president of the United States.”

Exactly 100 years after women were legally allowed to vote, Harris’ historical win and rise from humble roots provides hope for women in America and across the world.

Harris’ mother, Shyamala Gopalan, was came to the U.S. from India at age 19 to work as a biologist and researcher. Her father, Donald J Harris, came from Jamaica to study at Stanford University, where he received a PhD in economics.

Born in Oakland, California, she grew up in Berkeley, California. When her parents divorced at age 7, she and her younger sister, Maya, remained with their mother and visited with their father. She later moved to Quebec, Canada, with her sister and mother, who moved for work.

Kamala Harris with her mother and sister.

She would routinely visit her mother’s family in Madras (now Chen-nai) throughout her life, and was influenced by her maternal grandfather P. V. Gopalan, a retired Indian civil servant whose progressive views on democracy and women’s rights impressed her.

Harris graduated with degrees in political science and economics from Howard University in 1986 before attending the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. She served for two terms as district attorney of San Francisco before being elected as Attorney General of California in 2010.  She was the first woman of color and first woman to serve as AG, and she was re-elected for a second term in 2014.

Harris become the second African American woman and the first South Asian American to serve in the United States Senate in 2016. She introduced and cosponsored legislation to raise minimum wage, reform the criminal justice system, address the epidemic of substance abuse, support veterans and military families, and expand access to childcare for working parents.

She ran for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination but ended her run in December 2019. After Biden, 77, was chosen as the Democratic party nominee for president, he chose Harris, 56, as his running mate in August 2020. He referred to her as “a fearless fighter for the little guy, and one of the country’s finest public servants.”

As vice president, she has promised to share her “lived experience as it relates to any issue” they confront.  One of the first issues she promises to tackle with Biden is universal health care.

She said during a recent 60 Minutes interview, “…our plan includes expanding on everything that Joe together with President Obama created with the Affordable Care Act. By contrast, you have Donald Trump, who’s in Court right now trying to get rid of a policy that brought health care to over 20 million people, including protecting people with preexisting conditions.”

Her tenure as vice president will mark another first in her career, and it will also provide and inspire firsts for other career women for years to come.

Her tenure as vice president will mark another first in her career, and it will also provide and inspire firsts for other career women.