US Vice President Kamala Harris praised her boss, President Joe Biden, a day after he dropped out of the presidential race and endorsed her as his successor.
“Joe Biden's legacy of accomplishments over the last three years is unmatched in modern history,” Harris said Monday in her first public appearance since the 81-year-old U.S. leader abruptly announced his withdrawal from the November ballot a day earlier.
“In one term, he has already surpassed the legacy of most presidents who serve two terms in office,” Harris said at a White House event honoring college athletes, where she was filling in for Biden, who is recovering at his home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, after testing positive for COVID-19 last week.
In her statement, however, Harris, 59, did not specifically address her new status as the Democratic front-runner to replace Biden as the party's presidential nominee.
Meanwhile, virtually every prominent Democrat who had been seen as a potential rival to Harris has lined up behind her, including Nancy Pelosi, the former House speaker and one of the best-known and longest-serving Democrats.
Pelosi, who remains influential since stepping down as House speaker in 2022, played a major role in persuading Biden to end his campaign amid concerns about his mental acuity and ability to beat Republican Donald Trump or serve another four years.
“With love and gratitude, I salute President Biden for always believing in America’s possibilities and giving people the opportunity to achieve their fulfillment,” Pelosi, 84, said in a statement Monday.
“We must come together and move forward to resoundingly defeat Donald Trump and enthusiastically elect Kamala Harris as the next president of the United States.”
Biden and Harris have been working together since 2020. As the US president consolidated his lead in that year's election, he promised to choose a woman as his running mate. Harris' selection was seen as an effort to appeal to black voters and energize the party's base.
On Sunday, as he declared he was abandoning his re-election campaign, Biden wrote on X that his endorsement of Harris was “the best decision” he ever made.
Campaign officials and allies have already made hundreds of calls on Harris’ behalf, urging delegates to next month’s Democratic Party convention to unite behind nominating her for president in the Nov. 5 election against Trump.
The party's new candidate will be chosen at its convention in Chicago next month, when more than 4,000 party officials and activists will gather to vote.
However, Harris could still face rivals seeking the Democratic nomination in the coming days.
Rebekah Caruthers, vice president of the Fair Elections Center, told Al Jazeera that Harris has a strong track record when it comes to winning elections.
“She has been on the ballot many times, as district attorney and attorney general of California. She herself ran for president during the 2020 election cycle,” Caruthers said.
“One thing the Harris campaign has been saying: Every time Kamala Harris is on the ballot, she wins her election.”
But some Democrats were concerned about a Harris candidacy, in part because of the weight of a long history of racial and gender discrimination in the United States, which has not elected a woman president in its nearly 250-year history.
“We should all prepare for the onslaught of attacks that any historic nominee would face,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez told reporters. “Misogyny in our politics is far from over. Racism in our politics — especially when facing Donald Trump as an opponent — is far, far from over.”
