Kamala Harris secures Democratic nomination for 2024

US Vice President Kamala Harris formally secured the Democratic presidential nomination on Monday — becoming the first Black woman to lead a major party ticket.

More than four years after her first attempt at the presidency collapsed, Harris’ coronation as her party’s standard-bearer caps a tumultuous and frenetic period for Democrats prompted by President Joe Biden’s disastrous June debate performance that shattered his own supporters’ confidence in his re-election prospects and spurred extraordinary intraparty warfare about whether he should stay in the race.

Harris’ nomination became official after a five-day round of online balloting by Democratic National Convention delegates ended Monday night, with the party saying in a statement released just before midnight that 99 percent of delegates had cast their ballots for Harris.

The party said it would next formally certify the vote before holding a celebratory roll call at the party’s convention later this month in Chicago.

Already Harris has telegraphed that she doesn’t plan to veer much from the themes and polices that framed Biden’s candidacy. But her delivery can be far fierier, particularly when she invokes her prosecutorial background to lambast former president and Republican presidential candidate Trump.

A splash in Washington before a collapse in the 2020 primaries

Harris launched her 2020 presidential campaign with much promise, drawing parallels to former President Barack Obama and attracting more than 20,000 people to a kickoff rally in her hometown.

But Harris withdrew from the primary race before the first nominating contest in Iowa, plagued by staff dissent that spilled out into the open and an inability to attract enough campaign cash.

She also struggled to deliver a consistent pitch to Democratic voters and wobbled on key issues such as health care.

Joining Biden’s team

Still, Harris was at the top of the vice presidential shortlist when Biden was pondering his running mate, after his pledge in early 2020 that he would choose a Black woman as his No. 2.

Her first months as vice president were far from smooth. Biden asked her to lead the administration’s diplomatic efforts with Central America on the root causes of migration to the United States, which triggered attacks from Republicans on border security and remains a political vulnerability.

For her first two years, Harris also was often tethered to Washington so she could break tie votes in the evenly divided Senate, which gave Democrats landmark wins on the climate and health care but also constrained opportunities for her to travel around the country and meet voters.

Headed to the top of the ticket

After Biden ended his candidacy July 21, he quickly endorsed Harris. And during the first two weeks of her 2024 presidential bid, enthusiasm among the Democratic base surged.

“The country is able to see the Kamala Harris that we all know," said Bakari Sellers, who was a national co-chair of her 2020 campaign.

Yet Democrats are anticipating that Harris’ political honeymoon will wear off, and she is inevitably going to come under tougher scrutiny for Biden administration positions, the state of the economy and volatile situations abroad, particularly in the Middle East. Harris has also yet to answer extended questions from journalists or sit down for a formal interview since she began her run.

The Trump campaign has been eager to define Harris as she continues to introduce herself to voters nationwide, releasing an ad blaming her for the high number of illegal crossings at the southern border during the Biden administration.

Commenting on Harris’s racial identity, Trump said: “I didn’t know she was Black until a number of years ago when she happened to turn Black and now she wants to be known as Black.”

“So, I don’t know, is she Indian or is she Black?” he said, while addressing the annual convention of the National Association of Black Journalists on July 31.

In her response, Harris called it “the same old show — the divisiveness and the disrespect” and said voters “deserve better”.