Who is Kamala Harris, the first female vice president of the United States?

Kamala Harris (55), the flamboyant elected Vice President of the United States, does not fit into any American political stereotype: daughter of immigrants and from her American dream, she was raised as a feminist and progressive, but she broke the glass ceiling over and over again. with a pragmatic look at the power that guaranteed him a very heterogeneous allied bow.

Her family background has repeatedly earned her the nickname “the Obama woman”. She was born in 1964, three years after the former president, and, like him, is the daughter of immigrants, trained in law at a renowned university and owner of an undeniable charisma and a discourse difficult to classify.

Following the divorce of their parents – an economics professor from Jamaica and an endocrinologist and nutritionist from India – Harris and her sister Maya grew up in the 1960s and 1970s surrounded by their mother’s successful college friends. and feminist and progressive voices. of the black movement.

It gave them both a vision of racism, social justice and the penal system of the neighborhood tralucila polakbajadora class and civil struggle, but it also taught them from an early age to hang out with the political elite. .

In 1990, at just 25, Harris took office as Assistant Attorney General of Oakland, his hometown of California, at a time when then President Democrat Bill Clinton called for a helping hand for stop gangs and fight war. against drugs.

Eight years later, Harris took over as assistant attorney general for neighboring San Francisco, and in 2003, after clashing with management wanting minors to be tried in regular courts, he surprised everyone the world and called his boss to the polls. .

Harris won despite not having a good relationship with the party and became San Francisco’s first district attorney general at a time when 95% of those in the country were white and 83% were men, as reviewed at the time by San Francisco magazine.

He held this elective office for six years, and during that time he won both allies and detractors.

Victims of sexual abuse by the Catholic Church accused her of ignoring them and police unions declared war on her after she refused to seek the death penalty for the murder of a police officer. 29 years.

Since that time, Harris’ mantra has been smart, rather than brutal, criminal policy, as the New York Times recalled a few years ago.

Her pragmatism, charisma and reputation as a tough but committed patron allowed her to begin to make important allies within the Democratic Party, and in 2010 she was encouraged to take another unprecedented step and won the election of the attorney general of California.

In this election, only one of dozens of police unions supported her. Four years later, when she was re-elected, she was supported by nearly 50 unions of the force.

As Harris grew stronger in California, he also rose through the ranks of the Democratic Party as a new progressive and feminist voice.

The leap onto the national stage came in 2016 when she became one of the country’s few black senators and, quickly, one of the most articulate and relentless leaders in the face of misogyny, racism and economic policies. from the Donald government. Asset.

When she decided to run for the Democratic presidential primaries, her harshest critics reminded her that she had not changed the system of police and criminal brutality and racism in California in any meaningful way – as has it. showed the recent mass protests in this state.

But an even greater number of allies underscored his persistence in rising up in a world of white men, challenging blunt rhetoric and pushing for greater social inclusion.