Kamala Harris and Our Continued History of Firsts

Harris and Biden are a ticket now, and here’s why her heritage matters

I know that winning this race will be tougher than anything I’ve faced before, but I’ve never been more ready to roll up my sleeves and get to work. Donald Trump thinks this country belongs to him. But Joe Biden knows it belongs to all of us. To the people.

That’s according to Senator Kamala Harris, who this week became the first Black and South Asian American woman to ever be selected by a major political party to serve as vice president in a presidential campaign for the United States of America. The Black and South Asian part is important because she is biracial — her mom is Indian and her dad is Jamaican — and she is also the child of immigrants. Harris represents a real life example of that melting pot that so many of us were told about in our segregated grade school history classes.

Many Brown and Black people will say that her history as a prosecutor is problematic, but that history doesn’t negate her accomplishments as a multiracial woman of color in a field usually occupied by White men. She’s a first for at least two reasons, and that’s something to celebrate. Also, Danielle Moodie writes that Harris’s perceived imperfections are not worth pontificating about over and over and over again. After all, how many White men are expected to be perfect in the office of VP or president? And why is the bar 100 times higher for Harris than it is for say, the…