Who is Kamala Harris?

As US President Joe Biden dramatically dropped out of the upcoming presidential race earlier today, he announced his support for current Vice President Kamala Harris to be the Democratic nominee for the US 2024 presidential election.

If nominated, she would be the first Black and Tamil woman from a major political party to be a candidate for US presidential elections.

Though other names have been floated, Harris is a strong favourite, with only four months to go until the election and just a few weeks to the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.

In 2020, Harris made history when she became the first Black and Tamil woman to be elected the Vice President of the United States.

Tamil roots

The 59-year-old former California Senator was born in Oakland to two immigrant parents.

Harris’s mother, Shyamala Gopalan, is a Tamil woman who grew up in Chennai, whilst her father Donald grew up in Jamaica. In her memoir, Harris writes how she would visit Tamil Nadu almost every year and understands small amounts of Tamil, often using Tamil around the house to express “affection or frustration”.

In her address to the Democratic National Convention in 2020, Harris paid tribute to her ‘chithis’ (சித்தி) – a word in Tamil for aunties.

“Family is my uncles, my aunts — my chitthis,” she told the convention.See extracts from her memoirs below.

I was also very close to my mother’s brother, Balu, and her two sisters Sarala and Chinni (whom I called Chitti, which means “younger mother”). They lived many thousands of miles away, and we rarely saw one another. Still, through many long-distance calls, our periodic trips to India, and letters and cards written back and forth, our sins of family – of closeness and comfort and trust – was able to penetrate the distance. It’s how I first really learned that you can have very close relationships with people, even if it’s not on a daily basis. We were always there for one another, regardless of what form that would take.

My mother, grandparents, aunts and uncle instilled us with pride in our South Asian roots. Our classical Indian names harked back to our heritage, and we were raised with a strong sense of awareness of and appreciation for Indian culture. All of my mother’s words of affection or frustration came out in her mother tongue – which seems fitting to me, since the purity of those emotions is what I associate with my mother most of all.

Harris also spoke about the influence that her parents’ activism had on her life. See below:

They went to peaceful protests where they were attacked by police with hoses. They marched against the Vietnam War and for civil rights and voting rights. They went together to see Martin Luther King Jr. speak at Berkley, and my mother had a chance to meet him… But my parents and their friends were more than just protesters. They were big thinkers, pithing big ideas, organising their community.

^{Harris, far left, in a family photograph dressed in a traditional Tamil sari. (Courtesy of Sharada Balachandran Orihuela)}

In a speech at a “South Asians for Biden” in 2020, Harris also reminisced on her times in Chennai. “Growing up, my mother would take my sister Maya and me back to what was then called Madras because she wanted us to understand where she had come from and where we had ancestry,” she said. “And of course, she always wanted to instil in us a love of good idli.”

Harris told the Washington Post in February 2019 that her heritage “was one of the things that I struggled with” when she first ran for office. “You are forced through that process to define yourself in a way that you fit neatly into the compartment that other people have created,” she added.

“My point was: I am who I am. I’m good with it. You might need to figure it out, but I’m fine with it.”

Celebrations in Tamil Nadu and Jamacia

^{Photograph: News 18}

There were celebrations in both Tamil Nadu and Jamaica after she was elected Vice President of the United States in 2020.

In Thulasendrapuram, a village in the Tiruvarur district of Tamil Nadu, firecrackers were lit and rangoli patterns were drawn in celebration. “We are celebrating this as a woman whose roots are in our village is getting elected as the Vice President of America,” local resident Malar Vendhan told the News Minute. “It is a matter of immense pride. Not only for Tamilians in Tamil Nadu, but this victory is a matter of pride for all Tamilians across the world.”

“I’m extremely glad that Kamala Harris is the first woman to be elected as the Vice President of US,” tweeted then-Tamil Nadu’s Chief Minister EPalaniswami. “She has made Tamil Nadu proud with this astounding victory.”

Tamil Nadu Food Minister R Kamaraj visited the village at the time, where he prayed at a local temple and said the election of Harris is a “proud moment”. “A woman hailing from this small village now holds one of highest positions in the US,” said Kamaraj.

“Especially pleased that American people has chosen a woman with Tamil heritage as their next Vice-President in this historic election,” added DMK leader M K Stalin, who is now the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu. “Let her actions be a matter of pride not just for Thulasenthirapuram, but all Tamils,” said Amma Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam (AMMK) leader T T V Dhinakaran.

”Congratulations Kamala Harris, pride of our village,” read a rangoli pattern drawn by local Tamil women. ”Vanakkam America,” it added.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi also added his congratulations to Harris, adding that he is “confident that the vibrant India-US ties will get even stronger with [her] support and leadership.”

Meanwhile, celebrations also took place in Jamaica, where Harris can also trace her roots.

“I extend congratulations to the President-elect and Vice President-elect of the United States, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. America will have its first female Vice President in the person of Kamala Harris, and we are proud that she bears Jamaican heritage,” tweeted Jamaica’s Prime Minister Andrew Holness. “Her ascension to this role is a monumental accomplishment for women all over the world and I salute her. We look forward to working with the new administration.”

Delivering her victory speech, Harris paid tribute to her mother Shyamala Gopalan Harris, who she called “the woman most responsible for my presence here today”.

“When she came here from India at the age of 19, maybe she didn’t quite imagine this moment,” said Harris. “But she believed so deeply in America where a moment like this is possible, and so I am thinking about her and about the generations of women, Black women, Asian, white, Latina, Native American women — who throughout our nation’s history have paved the way for this moment — women who fought and sacrificed so much for equality and liberty and justice for all.”