Dear Editor,

US Vice-President Kamala Harris has a political career that is classic textbook.

She leveraged her legal training at the University of California into a position in the district attorney’s office. Then she ran for San Francisco district attorney, beating the incumbent in a run-off election. She came out on top of a crowded Democratic primary for California Attorney General and narrowly defeated her Republican opponent for the office in 2010.

She overwhelmingly beat her Republican opponent when she ran for re-election in 2014. When she ran for the US Senate in 2016, she garnered twice as many votes as the next-highest vote-getter, and in the final election earned more than 60 per cent of the vote.

The vice-president’s electoral history is well known, and I recount it for a reason. Harris earned increasing responsibility by running for office and winning. There is no diversity, equity, and inclusion in electoral politics. The only way you move up is to get more votes than your opponent. If there is any DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) in the Harris record, it’s ‘definitely earned it’.

Tennessee Congressman Tim Burchett made headlines in the US by describing Vice-President Harris as a “DEI hire”, describing her as “checking all the boxes”. Her electoral record refutes that. The vice-president didn’t just drop out of a coconut tree, to paraphrase her. She has worked for every office she has earned. To be sure, she was selected to serve as President Joe Biden’s running mate, but she would not have been had she not been elected so many times.

If the rabid Republicans stuck to describing the vice-president and presumptive Democratic presidential nominee as DEI, it would be an ill-placed slur. But former President Trump and his equally woman-hating vice-president have stooped even lower, describing her as “garbage”, “bum”, and “crazy”.

Throw a little “San Francisco liberal” in there to complete the predictable cocktail of slurs and attacks. No one is surprised by the Trump slurs, as the former president is amazingly consistent in his approach to his opponents. Indeed, the inarticulate nature of his slurs leads one to question his mental competency and suggest that he be tested for his comprehension. One wonders how his tirades will survive international negotiations.

Trump’s vice-presidential nominee JD Vance has the same relationship with truth as his boss. In making his case against “childless cat ladies”, he accuses Democrats, including Vice-President Harris, of being “anti-family”, but it is Democrats who have advocated pro-family policies, including the child tax credit that would lift millions of children out of poverty. Like Trump, Vance does not mind telling outright lies.

Kamala Harris is used to the lies, the slurs, the white male disdain. She’s had to deal with that throughout much of her career, as most women in power have. Trump is an expert at disparaging women, attacking their looks, their clothing, their mental acuity, and more. All I say to these rabid Republicans is: Bring it! Vance has described the Harris candidacy as a “gut punch” to the Trump-Vance ticket, but it is a knockout punch!

Instead of campaigning against a Biden they’d described as “old” and feeble, they’ve got an opponent who is young, energetic, and vital. Instead of debating the Biden who failed to challenge Trump on his incessant lies in the late June debate, he will be debating the prosecutor who sliced and diced Brett Kavanaugh during his Supreme Court confirmation hearing.

She has definitely earned the nomination of her party, and indeed the presidency.

Dr Julianne Malveaux

juliannemalvaux.com