XPost: talk.politics.guns, alt.politics.democrats.d, sac.politics   
   XPost: alt.california   
   From: prostitutes@legislature.ca.gov   
      
   Less than four months out from the election, Vice-President Kamala Harris   
   found herself in a difficult position.   
   President Joe Biden's poor performance on the debate stage spurred mounting   
   criticism about his ability to win the election. As anxiety turned to   
   tension within the Democratic party, her name rose up the list of   
   replacement candidates.   
   But the journey there has been fraught and full of difficult questions,   
   especially in recent months.   
      
   Four years ago, the one-time candidate for the Democratic nomination would   
   have welcomed the party's praises. By July 2024, Harris was in a more   
   precarious position as part of an embattled incumbent ticket, her chances of   
   another term tethered to Mr Biden’s performance.   
   In the 24 hours after the debate debacle, Ms Harris chose strong loyalty to   
   Mr Biden.   
   The vice-president spoke on CNN, MSNBC and at a campaign rally. She defended   
   her political partner's record and attacked their opponent, former President   
   Donald Trump.   
   “We believe in our president, Joe Biden, and we believe in what he stands   
   for,” she said at the rally.   
   Ms Harris never wavered as a new well of support within the Democratic party   
   pushed her into the spotlight and critics pressed Mr Biden to retire.   
   Still, it’s a second chance at a presidential campaign for the first woman   
   as well as the first black and Asian-American to serve as vice-president.   
   Despite struggling to appeal to voters in 2020 and having low approval   
   ratings during her tenure as vice president, Ms Harris' supporters point to   
   her advocacy for reproductive rights, appeal among black voters and her   
   background as a prosecutor who would be running against a now-convicted   
   felon to make the case for her serving as commander-in-chief.   
   "I believe she has been instrumental in addressing key issues such as voting   
   rights and immigration reform," Nadia Brown, director of Georgetown   
   University's Women's and Gender Studies Program, said.   
   "She has also been Biden's most powerful surrogate on issues of abortion   
   access and outreach to black communities."   
      
   How Kamala rose to become VP   
   Just five years ago, Ms Harris was the senator from California hoping to win   
   the Democratic nomination for presidency.   
   She began her career in the Alameda County District Attorney's Office and   
   became the district attorney - the top prosecutor - for San Francisco in   
   2003, before being elected the first woman and the first black person to   
   serve as California's attorney general, the top lawyer and law enforcement   
   official in America's most populous state.   
   She gained a reputation as one of the Democratic party's rising stars, using   
   this momentum to propel her to election as California's junior US senator in   
   2017.   
   But her presidential aims were unsuccessful in 2020.   
      
   Her adept debate performances were not enough to compensate for poorly   
   articulated policies.   
   Her campaign died in less than a year and it was Mr Biden who returned the   
   now 59-year-old to the national spotlight by putting her on his ticket.   
   Gil Duran, a communications director for Ms Harris in 2013 who critiqued her   
   run for the presidential nomination, called it “a big reversal of fortune   
   for Kamala Harris”.   
   "Many people didn't think she had the discipline and focus to ascend to a   
   position in the White House so quickly... although people knew she had   
   ambition and star potential. It was always clear that she had the raw   
   talent,” Duran said.   
      
   She launched a nationwide “Fight for Reproductive Freedoms” tour advocating   
   for women to have the right to make decisions about their body. She   
   highlighted harm caused by abortion bans and called on Congress to restore   
   the protections of Roe v Wade after the Supreme Court's conservative   
   justices overturned the constitutional right to abortion in 2022.   
   Ms Harris set a new record for the most tie-breaking votes cast by a vice   
   president in the history of the Senate. Her vote helped pass the Inflation   
   Reduction Act and the American Rescue Plan, which provided Covid relief   
   funding including stimulus payments.   
   Her tie-breaking vote also confirmed Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson to the   
   Supreme Court.   
      
   But she also struggled to achieve broad appeal among Americans, facing   
   criticism on all sides.   
   Despite leftward leanings on issues like gay marriage and the death penalty,   
   she faced repeated attacks for not being progressive enough for some   
   Democratic voters. "Kamala is a cop" was a common refrain on the 2020   
   campaign trail.   
   Mr Biden also called upon Ms Harris to lead efforts addressing the root   
   causes of migration as a record number of immigrants fled to the US-Mexico   
   border, an issue opponents point to as one where she hasn't made enough   
   progress.   
   She received backlash from Republicans and some Democrats for taking six   
   months to plan a trip to the border after entering office.   
   But in recent weeks, as speculation about Mr Biden's ability to win in   
   November swirled, she found a renewed base of support.   
      
   The many identities of Kamala Harris   
   Born in Oakland, California, to two immigrant parents - an Indian-born   
   mother and Jamaican-born father - her parents divorced when she was five and   
   she was primarily raised by her Hindu single mother, Shyamala Gopalan   
   Harris, a cancer researcher and civil rights activist.   
   She grew up engaged with her Indian heritage, joining her mother on visits   
   to India, but Ms Harris has said that her mother adopted Oakland's black   
   culture, immersing her two daughters - Kamala and her younger sister Maya -   
   within it.   
   "My mother understood very well that she was raising two black daughters,"   
   she wrote in her autobiography The Truths We Hold. "She knew that her   
   adopted homeland would see Maya and me as black girls and she was determined   
   to make sure we would grow into confident, proud black women."   
   Her biracial roots and upbringing mean she embodies and can engage with and   
   appeal to many American identities. Those parts of the country which have   
   seen rapid demographic change, enough change to alter a region's politics,   
   see an aspirational symbol in her.   
      
   But it was her time at Howard University, one of the nation's preeminent   
   historically black colleges and universities, which she has described as   
   among the most formative experiences of her life.   
   Lita Rosario-Richardson met Kamala Harris while at Howard in the 1980s when   
   students would gather in the Yard area of the campus to hang out and discuss   
   politics, fashion and gossip.   
   "I noticed she had a keen sense of argumentation," she said.   
      
   They bonded over an aptitude for energetic debate with campus Republicans,   
   their experience growing up with single mothers, even just both being the   
   Libra star sign. It was a formative era politically too.   
   "Reagan was president at the time and it was the apartheid era and there was   
   a lot of talk about divestiture with 'trans Africa' and the Martin Luther   
      
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