On January 20, 2021, Kamala Harris was sworn in as the 49th Vice President of the United States— the first woman, the first Black American, and the first South Asian American to be elected to this position.
As Vice President, she brought people together to advance opportunity, deliver for families, and protect fundamental freedoms. She led the fight for the freedom of women to make decisions about their own bodies, the freedom to live safe from gun violence, the freedom to vote, and the freedom to drink clean water and breathe clean air. She took particular focus on job creation through the investment in our nation’s small business and community banks. She also presided over the vote to confirm the first Black woman, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, to the Supreme Court. While visiting 36 states and making history at home, she represented the nation abroad — embarking on 17 foreign trips, traveling to 21 countries, and meeting with more than 150 world leaders to strengthen critical global alliances.
The Biden-Harris administration delivered monumental achievements that are life-changing for millions of Americans. The President & Vice President were focused on investing in economic opportunity resulting in a record 21 million new small business applications, created a record 16 million jobs, lowered the unemployment rate to the lowest average in 50 years , capped the cost of insulin at $35 a month for seniors, cut prescription drug prices, and improved maternal health by expanding postpartum care through Medicaid. They passed the largest investment in a generation to upgrade the nation’s water, transportation, and internet infrastructure and the Vice President cast the tie breaking vote on the largest investment ever to tackle the climate crisis.
On July 21, 2024, Vice President Harris announced her campaign for president after President Joe Biden withdrew his bid for reelection. She officially became the party's nominee on August 5 after a formal roll call vote of DNC delegates and made history again as the first Black woman and first South Asian woman nominated for president by a major U.S. political party.
Vice President Harris’ campaign promised a future where we protect and fight for fundamental freedoms, including a women’s right to make decisions about her own body, and focused on a vision of ensuring all Americans can climb the ladder of economic opportunity, including by bringing down the cost of living and making housing more affordable. In just 107 days - the shortest general election presidential campaign in modern American history - Vice President Harris rallied the country around a "new generation of leadership” earning the votes of 75 million Americans.
Fighting for the people is nothing new for Kamala Harris.
In 2017, she was sworn into the United States Senate where she championed legislation to fight hunger, provide rent relief, improve maternal health care, expand access to capital for small businesses, revitalize America’s infrastructure, and combat the climate crisis. She questioned two Supreme Court nominees while serving on the Judiciary Committee. She also worked to keep the American people safe from foreign threats and crafted bipartisan legislation to assist in securing American elections while serving on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.
In 2010, Vice President Harris was elected Attorney General of California where she oversaw the largest state justice department in the country. She took on those who were preying on the American people, winning a $20 billion settlement for Californians whose homes had been foreclosed on and a $1.1 billion settlement for students and veterans who were taken advantage of by a for-profit education company. As Attorney General she cracked down on the transnational gangs that smuggled drugs, guns and people across the U.S.-Mexico border. She also defended the Affordable Care Act in court and enforced laws to protect public health and the environment.
Following years as a courtroom prosecutor in Oakland standing up for women and children against predators who abused them, in 2004, Vice President Harris was elected District Attorney of San Francisco. There she was a national leader in the movement for LGBTQ+ rights, officiating some of the first same-sex weddings. She also established the office’s environmental justice unit and created a ground-breaking program to provide first-time drug offenders with the opportunity to earn a high school degree and find employment, which the U.S. Department of Justice designated as a national model of innovation for law enforcement.
Vice President Harris was born in Oakland, California. She was raised by a diverse community and a loving extended family. She and her sister, Maya, were inspired by their mother, Dr. Shyamala Gopalan Harris, a breast cancer scientist and pioneer in her own right who came to the United States from India at the age of 19 and then received her doctorate the same year that Kamala was born.
Both of the Vice President’s parents were active in the civil rights movement and instilled in her a commitment to build strong coalitions that fight for the rights and freedoms of all people. They brought her to civil rights marches in a stroller and taught her about heroes like Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall and civil rights leader Constance Baker Motley.
Vice President Harris went on to graduate from Howard University and the University of California Hastings College of Law. In 2014, she married Douglas Emhoff, a lawyer. They have a large blended family that includes their children, Ella and Cole.
As a trailblazer throughout her entire career, the Vice President is committed to fulfilling her mother’s advice: “Kamala, you may be the first to do many things, but make sure you are not the last.”
