The powerful duality of Kamala Harris’ ascent

Two weeks after a deadly insurrection put on display the White outrage that threatens the country’s multiracial democracy, a dramatically different scene unfolded at the US Capitol.

Yesterday, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris were sworn into office.

The inauguration of the first female, first Black and first South Asian vice president following the aforementioned assault did two things at once — marked a hopeful turning point in the long fight for racial representation and justice, and underscored in sobering fashion that confronting White supremacy will be one of the new administration’s main challenges.

Harris’ political rise even just over the past one and a half years is nothing to scoff at. Maybe most obviously, the former California senator’s ascent to the vice presidency will change the face of power in a literal way.

There was no shortage of coverage of how the 2020 Democratic primary field, which Harris was a part of, began as one of the most noteworthy in history. More specifically, the diversity of the slate of candidates who vied for the nomination was unprecedented: Latino, Asian, Black, gay, female. In December 2019, though, Harris suspended her campaign, as the field gradually congealed around straightness and Whiteness and maleness.

It was no small thing, then, when Biden chose Harris as his running mate in August. “It just feels like Black girls like me can run for class president. Black girls like me can go for the big things in life like she did,” Paris Bond, a teenager, told CNN that month.

Source: cnn.com

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