Washington : Senator Kamala Harris has scripted history as she became the first Indian-American and also the first Black woman to accept the nomination for vice-president from a major political party in the US.
Harris, 55, was nominated as the vice-presidential candidate on Wednesday at the virtual Democratic National Convention where she attacked President Donald Trump’s for “failure of leadership” and blamed the Republican leader for the “lives and livelihoods” of the American people amidst the coronavirus pandemic. I accept your nomination for vice president of the United States of America, she said while accepting the Democratic Party’s nomination to be the running mate of the presidential candidate Joe Biden.
In her acceptance speech, Harris paid tribute to the Black women that came before her and she vowed to fight for the nation.
“Let’s fight with conviction. Let’s fight with hope. Let’s fight with confidence in ourselves, and a commitment to each other,” she said. She profoundly remembered her mother from Tamil Nadu.
Harris said her mother raised her and her sister to be proud, strong Black women. And she raised us to know and be proud of our Indian heritage. She taught us to put family first the family you’re born into and the family you choose.
In reference to her Indian heritage, Harris used a Tamil expression in speaking of my uncles, my aunts my chitthis.
Harris said she was there standing on her mother’s shoulders, a woman who came here from India at age 19 to pursue her dream of curing cancer. At the University of California, Berkeley, she met my father, Donald Harris who had come from Jamaica to study economics.
She assailed Trump’s “failure of leadership”.
She said the Republican leader “turns our tragedies into political weapons”.
Former vice president Joe Biden and Harris will challenge Trump and his Vice-President Mike Pence in the November 3 election.
We must elect a president who will bring something different, something better, and do the important work. A president who will bring all of us together Black, White, Latino, Asian, Indigenous to achieve the future we collectively want, Harris said, making a passionate plea before Americans to vote them to power. (PTI)