“There’s no vaccine for racism.” Kamala Harris told her family's American story, ripped into Donald Trump, and touted Joe Biden as she became the first woman of color to accept a major party's VP nomination
It is truly an honor to be speaking with you.
Women like Mary Church Terrell and Mary McCleod Bethune. Fannie Lou Hamer and Diane Nash. Constance Baker Motley and Shirley Chisholm.There’s another woman, whose name isn’t known, whose story isn’t shared. Another woman whose shoulders I stand on. And that’s my mother—Shyamala Gopalan Harris. When I was 5, my parents split and my mother raised us mostly on her own. Like so many mothers, she worked around the clock to make it work—packing lunches before we woke up— and paying bills after we went to bed. Helping us with homework at the kitchen table—and shuttling us to church for choir practice.My mother instilled in my sister, Maya, and me the values that would chart the course of our lives.
I’ve fought for children, and survivors of sexual assault. I’ve fought against transnational gangs. I took on the biggest banks, and helped take down one of the biggest for-profit colleges.My mother taught me that service to others gives life purpose and meaning. And oh, how I wish she were here tonight but I know she’s looking down on me from above. I keep thinking about that 25-year-old Indian woman—all of five feet tall—who gave birth to me at Kaiser Hospital in Oakland, California.
A country where we look out for one another, where we rise and fall as one, where we face our challenges, and celebrate our triumphs—together.Donald Trump’s failure of leadership has cost lives and livelihoods. The injustice in reproductive and maternal health care. In the excessive use of force by police. And in our broader criminal justice system.And let’s be clear—there is no vaccine for racism. We’ve gotta do the work.
And what also moved me about Joe is the work he did, as he went back and forth. This is the leader who wrote the Violence Against Women Act—and enacted the Assault Weapons Ban. Who, as Vice President, implemented The Recovery Act, which brought our country back from The Great Recession. He championed The Affordable Care Act, protecting millions of Americans with pre-existing conditions.
Make no mistake, the road ahead will not be not easy. We will stumble. We may fall short. But I pledge to you that we will act boldly and deal with our challenges honestly. We will speak truths. And we will act with the same faith in you that we ask you to place in us.We see it in the doctors, the nurses, the home health care workers and the frontline workers who are risking their lives to save people they’ve never met.
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