Sen. Kamala Harris announces bid for Democratic presidential nomination

Sen. Kamaal Harris enters the 2020 presidential race

(Image credit: Screenshot/Twitter/GMA)

published 21 January 2019

On Monday morning, Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) announced that she's running for president in 2020, joining fellow Senate Democrats Elizabeth Warren (Mass.) and Kirsten Gillibrand (N.Y.) in a crowded early field for the Democratic nomination. Harris, 54, made her announcement in a video posted online and also on ABC's Good Morning America.

"The future of our country depends on you and millions of others lifting our voices to fight for our American values," Harris said in her video. "That's why I'm running for president of the United States." She will more formally kick off her campaign in Oakland, California, next Sunday. Elected to the Senate in 2016, Harris was California's attorney general and before that, a district attorney. Harris — the daughter of a father who immigrated from Jamaica and mother who immigrated from India — would be the first woman, first Asian-American, and first black woman to be elected president. "Let's be honest, it's going to be ugly," Harris told MSNBC's Mika Brzezinski in December. "When you break things, it is painful. And you get cut. And you bleed."

Harris, who was raised by her mother after her parents' divorce, grew up attending a Hindu temple and black Baptist church, The Washington Post notes, and she attended the historically black Howard University before getting her law degree from the University of California Hastings College of the Law.

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.