WASHINGTON: For years, Kamala Harris faced criticism that she was not up to the task of being one step away from the presidency. Now, Democrats see her as their best hope of stopping Donald Trump's comeback.
Despite breaking ground as the first Black and South Asian woman to be vice president in U.S. history, the 59-year-old Democrat long struggled with approval ratings as bad or worse than President Joe Biden's.
The past 12 months, however, have revealed a transformed Harris.
And with Biden endorsing Harris after shocking the world by dropping out of his own re-election bid on Sunday, she is suddenly on the brink of history.
Harris hopes she has worked hard to win the support of her entire party amid the crisis.
As the aging Biden faded over the past year, his “vice president” emerged as a force on the campaign trail, pushing for abortion rights and reaching out to core voters, including suburban women and Black men.
With her fondness for the word f and her family nickname of “Momala” going viral, she has also finally begun to break through the noise for voters who previously barely paid attention to her.
He has also won praise in party circles for staying loyal to the 81-year-old president in recent weeks, even as political vultures circled his candidacy.
She is now likely to face Trump, a brutal battle against a candidate who defeated Hillary Clinton in her bid to become the first female commander in chief in 2016.
The fact that Harris has attributed much of the Republican criticism of her to racism and sexism would likely make a victory even more vindicating for her.
Trump and other Republicans have notably stepped up their attacks on her as Biden's standing weakened and polls showed Harris would fare better against him than against Biden.
Ready to serve
The daughter of immigrant parents (her father was from Jamaica and her mother from India), Harris grew up in Oakland, California, in an activist household that saw her attend her first rallies in a stroller.
Her focus on rights and justice led her to build an impressive CV, becoming California's first Black attorney general and the first woman of South Asian descent elected to the U.S. Senate.
Harris then faced Biden in the 2020 primaries. In a harsh attack, she criticized him for allegedly opposing busing students to segregated schools.
“There was a little girl in California who was in the second class to be integrated into public schools and who was taken to school by bus every day. And that little girl was me,” she said in a scathing attack on her future boss.
But as his running mate, she cemented the coalition that helped defeat incumbent President Trump in 2020.
However, his transition to the White House proved difficult.
Critics said his performance was disappointing and error-prone in a job that has baffled many officials.
Struggling to find a role, Biden tasked her with getting to the roots of the illegal immigration problem, but she faltered and then became defensive in response to a question during a visit to the Mexican border.
Unusually high staff turnover fueled rumors of discontent in the vice president's office.
And Republicans relentlessly attacked her as unfit to serve if the worst were to happen to the oldest president in U.S. history, often resorting to stereotypes her supporters called sexist and racist.
Harris told the Wall Street Journal In February: “I'm ready to serve. There's no doubt about it.”
'Mother'
Things started to change as the 2024 race got underway.
The Biden campaign repeatedly sent her to battleground states to reinforce the party's message on abortion rights, and Harris became the first vice president to visit an abortion clinic.
Little by little, he began to attract warm and enthusiastic crowds.
Some of the outreach, however, was cringe-inducing. Earlier this year, she was mocked when she told talk show host Drew Barrymore that her family sometimes called her “Momala,” and Barrymore responded, “We need you to be the country's Momala.”
But voters seemed enthusiastic.
A clip of her quoting her mother as often saying “Do you think you just fell out of a coconut tree?” became a meme, with a growing sense among her followers that now could be her time.
If elected, Harris would break one of the highest remaining glass ceilings for women in the United States: holding the highest office in the country.
Her husband, Douglas Emhoff, is also reportedly breaking new ground, moving from being the current Second Gentleman to the country's first First Gentleman.
