Kamala Harris wins with Biden and will be the first black...

By Marina E. Franco and Diana Baptista / Noticias Telemundo

Kamala Harris just made history by being voted for vice president. Besides being the daughter of immigrants, she is the first woman, first black woman, and first of South Asian descent in reaching that position.

And perhaps the most important thing is not her achievement this Saturday, but the legacy it leaves: the path for future candidates like her.

“While I may be the first woman in this position, I will not be the last, because all the girls who watch tonight see that this is a country of possibilities,” Harris said in her first speech as vice president of the United States.

[Revise todos los resultados de esta elección 2020]

“The more women there are in such visible positions, more women will apply“Karen O’Connor, a scholar at the American University Institute on Women and Politics and author of several books on US politics and legislators, told Noticias Telemundo.

If Harris “has a prominent position” as she takes office in the White House, “it paves the way not just for her to run again for the presidency in the future, but for other women to do so,” said political scientist O’Connor.

Her victory as vice president-elect comes four years after Hillary Clinton was selected as the first US presidential candidate from a major party.

It also occurs in a year where there has been a lot of talk globally about the benefits of having women politicians at the highest levels, such as the discussion that Countries led by women have weathered the COVID-19 pandemic better.

A growing presence of female civil servants benefits American politics – andThey tend to promote more laws In addition to being seen as more trustworthy and capable of achieving commitments, it also promotes the participation of future generations of women by normalizing their presence in politics, specialists agree.

This year too there were a record number of women seeking to reach Congress, both Democrats and Republicans, according to the Center for American Women and Politics, and in January there will be at least 131 female congressmen, a record.

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Harris has won local, state and federal political races, as a prosecutor and senator; it has both a legislative and judicial track record. And although she withdrew her presidential candidacy in December partly due to lack of fundraising, as soon as she was announced for the formula with Biden, campaign donations for the former vice president multiplied.

Who is Kamala Harris?

Harris is the daughter of Shyamala Gopalan, a biologist originally from India, and Donald J. Harris, a Stanford University professor emeritus from Jamaica, both with doctoral studies. The vice president-elect was born on October 20, 1964, in Oakland, California, a state where she grew up in areas with predominantly black populations.

The vice president-elect attended the prestigious Howard University in Washington DC, where she graduated with studies in political science and economics. Later, he graduated in Law from the University of California.

His career in public service began in 1990 as a Deputy District Attorney for Alameda County, California. During the next 12 years he served in various positions in the prosecution, in which he prosecuted criminal cases and against people accused of child abuse.

From 2004 to 2011, she was elected district attorney in San Francisco, becoming the first black person to take office. As a prosecutor, refused to seek death penalty sentences for people accused in court. This opposition has continued throughout his career: in 2019, he criticized in a statement that the Federal Bureau of Prisons resumed capital punishment, considering that it affects black and Latino people unequally.

In 2011, Harris again made history by becoming the first black woman of South Asian descent to arrive in charge of California attorney general. In his role, he defended the rights of the LGBTQ community, such as equal marriage.

His management was questioned; They accused her of not having done enough to correct the mass incarceration and of failing to prosecute cases related to deaths linked to police shootings.

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In his career as Senator, since 2017, opposed various policies of the Donald Trump Administration. He expressed his rejection of the migratory veto that prohibited the access of people from several countries with Muslim populations, and of the family separation measures at the border.

She was also one of the promoters of the legislation called Medicare for All, promoted by Senator Bernie Sanders. This program seeks all Americans to be covered with government-subsidized health insurance, such as the healthcare systems of Canada or the United Kingdom. Conservative and libertarian-minded critics opposed the legislation, believing that federal spending on health care would increase dramatically and that the quality of services would supposedly decline.

In 2019, Harris also introduced a more moderate plan to expand Medicare, the program to subsidize health insurance for people over 65 or with a disability.

Why Harris Poll Success Matters

It seems that voters in the United States are leaving behind certain stereotypes that have affected female candidates in the past.

In 2001, a 42% of the United States public believed that a man would always be better than a woman for the presidential office. By May of this year, according to a Gallup poll, 94% of Americans said they they would vote for a female president in the White House.

Only 13% publicly admitted in polls this year that they consider that men are better qualified for the position, in contrast to 20% who said 20 years ago that the country would do worse if there were more women in the government.

With these changing perceptions, and achievements such as an unprecedented number of candidates voted for Congress in 2018, “waves are forming that grow over time, as the parties realize that women are instrumental and valuable,” she told Noticias Telemundo Christabel Cruz, director of the NEW Leadership program at Rutgers University, aimed at promoting more young women into the political field with leadership training.

In United States the so-called political ‘glass ceiling’ has been breaking little by little. Just 100 years ago the country recognized the right of women to vote, recently commemorated with the anniversary of the 19th Amendment.

Voting a candidate for political office has benefits for the general population, according to historical analysis.

For example, they are more health and economic measures in favor of families. In the US Congress, female legislators, on average, get twice as many laws passed as their male counterparts and are more willing to work in a bipartisan manner, according to studies.

On average, between 1984 and 2004, female congresswomen managed to get more funding to their districts than male legislators did, according to a analysis by specialists from Stanford University.

“At the legislative level, voters tend to view women as more honest, hard-working and compliant on home affairs,” said O’Connor, the American University political scientist.

O’Connor added that seeing a campaign in which the vice presidential hopeful was more than ornament, and a favorable Biden-Harris working relationship as soon as they arrive in the White House, will have a positive effect for the female population from the country.

The political scientist even predicted that the Democratic cabinet will be more equal and with more women than it has been so far in American history.

“I think this time the balance is now in favor of the contributions made by women are clearly recognized, and especially black, Asian or Latina women ”, he pointed out.