Kamala Harris' DNC speech was full of tributes to Black women leaders — and her mother
Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) made history in many ways as she accepted the Democratic party's vice presidential nomination Wednesday. But in her Democratic National Convention speech, she was sure to thank all the women who'd helped her get there.
"That I am here tonight is a testament to the dedication of generations before me; women and men who believed so fiercely in promise of equality, liberty, and justice for all," Harris said to start his speech as the first Black and South Asian woman on a major party's presidential ticket. She then acknowledged how this week marked the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment, and how hard Black women had to work after its ratification to ensure their own voting rights as well.
"Women like Mary Church Terrell, Mary McCleod Bethune, Fannie Lou Hamer, and Diane Nash, Constance Baker Motley, and the great Shirley Chisholm," Harris recounted. "We're not always told their stories, but we all stand on their shoulders." And then Harris pivoted to "another woman whose name isn't known:" her mother, Shamala Gopalan Harris. Harris then described how her mother immigrated to the U.S. and met her father at the University of California, Berkeley, and weaved her mother's story through the rest of her speech, knowing "she's looking down on me from above." Kathryn Krawczyk
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Kathryn is a graduate of Syracuse University, with degrees in magazine journalism and information technology, along with hours to earn another degree after working at SU's independent paper The Daily Orange. She's currently recovering from a horse addiction while living in New York City, and likes to share her extremely dry sense of humor on Twitter.
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