Why I am Voting for Kamala Harris

With another election season winding down and the political climate as chaotic as ever, I would like to take a moment and share my two bits concerning the presidential race and who I am voting for and why. To be forthright, I want to declare my endorsement and support for Vice President Kamala Harris for the executive office. I admit that I had my reservations when she first took up the candidacy from President Biden. I voted for Joe Biden in 2020 because I saw that he had the experience and ability to work with the other side of the aisle to keep the gears in Washington moving, something that his predecessor failed to do on every level. Despite a trying term in office, I firmly believe that Biden was who we needed through it all and helped our country navigate the worst of the inevitable post pandemic recovery. Kamala Harris on the other hand was rarely in the spotlight, leans further left than Biden, and has not shown the same ability for negotiation with Republicans that the President has touted throughout his career. Nevertheless, Kamala Harris has served as the key factor in tie-breaking votes in the Senate and was integral in the decisions of the Biden Administration. Her assignment to find the source of the immigration crisis is finally bearing fruit, yet many have been led to the conjecture that she was the proclaimed “border czar,” though that was a term originating among conservatives, and the Southern border was not in fact among her responsibilities. Because of these falsehoods that have spread like wildfire among conservative pundits, the Vice President is portrayed as being hands off with her responsibilities, serving as a hindrance to her campaign today. Through all of this, it is my hope that Kamala Harris has learned a few lessons from President Biden over the past four years and that, if she becomes president, she will take those lessons to heart in upholding bipartisan cohesion by maintaining open dialogue with Republicans and a willingness to make healthy compromises.

I think for most people it is always exciting when someone becomes the first to achieve something great. The first man on the moon, or the first to climb Mt. Everest are spectacular feats. It is equally exciting when the first person of a minority or marginalized group achieves those same feats. I strongly feel that representation matters and diversity among America’s great achievers helps to inspire the communities they come from. For this reason, the prospect of Kamala Harris becoming our first woman president is equally as exciting, but I do not believe that the novelty of being the first should be the only aspect when deciding on someone who will lead our nation for the next four to eight years. For instance, I did not vote for Hillary Clinton in 2016 because I had deep reservations concerning her performance as Secretary of State and her handling of the Benghazi Attack of 2012. Kamala Harris, on the other hand, has no such detrimental mark on her record, and as I did with Biden in 2020, I also took into account the controversies and mistakes Harris has made throughout her career, especially during her days as the Attorney General of California. While in that position, there were two incidents that caught my attention and evaluation. First being Harris’ truancy program that would punish parents of children who had missed a certain amount of school. This led to the arrest of Cheree Peoples, a single mother whose daughter was diagnosed with a chronic illness that led to her missing a lot of school. Kamala Harris has expressed regret for the law being enforced to the point of arrest, and has stated that it was mainly meant to get parents to come to the table with teachers and school administrators to address problems and help kids stay in school. 

The other issue that was raised while the Vice President was AG regards a man on death row named Kevin Cooper who was accused and found guilty of murdering a family of four and her denial of DNA evidence to be evaluated back in 2011. Just a quick glance through a few pages online shows a complicated story over forty years in the making with most evidence pointing to Cooper’s guilt, yet certain vagaries in some of the accounts and possible tampering of evidence could have taken place. At the time, Harris did not believe more analysis of the DNA would have swayed the verdict and denied it for that reason. She has since changed her position and instead supports newer and more accurate DNA testing. For the record, the tests did not exonerate Cooper and he is now fighting against a new investigation that points to his guilt. 

Moving forward to the present, Kamala Harris’ proposals such as unrealized gains tax, which would finally make the super rich pay fair taxes, and new homeowner incentives are both ideas I can get behind. Her stance on women’s rights and even gun rights are mostly along my views, though I do feel her stance on immigration is more conservative than I would like, whereas I believe in a compassionate immigration system that is open to anyone of any skill level who wants to improve themselves, their family and our country, taking only into account their criminal records. Yet, Republicans have gone down a dark extreme when dealing with immigrants, and even Harris’ lukewarm stance is by far better than what horrors the right has in store. Despite the areas I disagree with or see as problematic, I still believe she is the best choice on the ballot, has the qualifications, experience and demeanor for the highest office of the land which is in complete contrast to her opponent.

Now that I’ve made my case for Kamala Harris, I would now like to take a look at the other side of the spectrum. Anyone who knows me, or has read my posts or blogs concerning politics, will know that I am not a fan of Donald Trump. My issues with him began when he first announced his candidacy for president in 2015 and his derisive opinions on Mexican immigrants. Beyond that, I also disagree with his policies, his words, his actions, and even his very character. How he drives wedges among our allies and cozies up to tyrants and despots is an insult to our legacy as a republic founded on democracy. His four year term as president resulted in utter stagnation in Washington, effectively growing “the swamp” rather than draining it. Trump also served up the longest government shutdown in the history of this country. The guy has repeatedly shown that he was incapable of negotiating any deals with Democrats and instead reverted to grade school insults and name calling. He freed over 5,000 Taliban fighters effectively hamstringing the withdrawal efforts in Afghanistan which he wanted to employ four months before Biden did. Trump self-identified as a nationalist and inspired supremacism among his most extreme supporters, downplayed a global pandemic that hindered our country’s response, and propagated conspiracies of election fraud that spurred the botched insurrection attempt on January 6th. 

In an attempt to be fair, there were two things that Trump did during his presidency that I agreed with. First was removing the Obama era penalty to those who refuse to get health insurance. That is a personal choice and ought to be respected without repercussions. Second, his then Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos proposed removing federal funding to the Special Olympics, which Trump, to his credit, outrightly denied on the spot. But in the words of Commodore Norrington from Pirates of the Caribbean, “One good deed is not enough to redeem a man of a lifetime of wickedness,” which adequately surmises my views on Trump. 

Because of his demonizing of political opponents, rampant xenophobia, failure to introduce a single bipartisan bill, left every campaign promise he made unfulfilled, and worsened the partisan divide of this country, I am firmly against Trumpism and what the GOP has devolved into since he sat in the oval office. If he were to regain the presidency, I foresee an exact repeat of his first term in office. The political gap would only widen among Americans, resulting in more turmoil and fiercer confrontations from both sides. Our aid to Ukraine would quickly dissolve, allowing Putin to conquer the whole country and become an even greater threat to our allies in Europe. Undocumented migrants will be terrorized once again by the prospect of deportation, which includes children and even adults who have little, or sometimes no connection to their country of origin. We will see greater tax benefits and immunity going towards the elite (like the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2018) to better line the pockets of Trump’s cronies and cohorts. Women’s rights to abortion would continue to worsen, and even LGBTQ+ rights could be on the chopping block according to proponents of Project 2025. 

There is a lot on the line this election, though despite the apocalyptic preaching of both the mainstream and fringe media outlets, if Trump were to win I firmly believe we can endure another four years, and liberals may actually be thankful for it in 2028. Why would a second Trump term be a good thing for the left? My reasoning is a three fold answer. First, Trump would only get one more term. The 22nd Amendment of the Constitution establishes that fact explicitly. He would not have enough time to cause as much damage as he could have with a consecutive two terms. Second, Trump was never popular at any point during his administration. His average approval rating was sitting at 41%  according to most polls I looked up, (including Fox News) and he never even rose above 49% at his highest. What makes anyone think that his approval will be any better this time around? And a low approval rating will negatively affect the next Republican candidate in 2028, giving the Democrat challenger a huge advantage. Third, a Democrat victory in 2028 could lead to a decisive rearranging of the Supreme Court with conservative Justices, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito currently both in their mid-70’s and would be hitting around the 80 mark in another four years. As for myself, a Trump victory would be a major disappointment, but it won’t change my daily life as far as I can foresee. I don’t think it will be the end of America, or that a civil war will break out, as so many on both ends of the political extreme would like you to believe. I will still do everything I can to improve myself and do whatever part I can in improving other’s lives as well. However, I do fear for my friends, family and neighbors who are members of the LGBTQ+, or undocumented communities that may be negatively affected by the policies and actions that another Trump Administration could unleash.

As this race becomes more and more volatile and we are nearing the finish line, I would like to exhort my fellow Americans to not project the negative feelings they have for the candidate they dislike upon the people in their lives who may support them. Some of the most amazing and inspiring people in my life are Trump supporters. And though we may vehemently disagree on nearly every issue, I hope that we may try our best not to see them as a proxy of their candidate. We all see the world differently. We learn different lessons and apply them in ways that promote our own sense of right and wrong. In short, we are simple yet strangely complex creatures doing the best we can with the time, resources and capability that we have. Though I myself have struggled with this in the past, today I try not to judge a person by who they vote for, rather I will judge them by their own words and actions, which may greatly differ from my perceptions of who they vote for. 

The election this year is incredibly close. Nearly every battleground state is polling within the margin of error. There is no way to accurately predict the outcome on November 5th. I only hope that no matter who comes out victorious, we can all accept the results and move on with our lives all the while still loving and empathizing with those whom we disagree with. Everyone who votes is trying to support their country in their own way. I hope we can honor that intent and promote compromises and bipartisanship in a country that seems to be ever dividing into dueling ideologies.