This week is now the second week of school, first full week for my kids. My kids are at different schools this year and have different drop off and pick up times. I pick the youngest up first, right around 2:50. Her brother is dismissed at 3:50, giving us an hour to catch up while we wait in the pick up line. My daughter is a very curious kid and likes to ask a million questions a day, some of which I can actually answer. Like her mother, she was interested in politics from a young age. I was only a little older than she was when I first volunteered to stand outside a polling site to pass out materials for John Day and eventually the late Julia Carson. I’ve been very honest with my kids about what is happening around the country and she has formed the opinion that Donald Trump is a bad guy, the worst of all the bad guys.
As we were waiting in the car on Monday she started asking a series of questions about the upcoming election and how Donald Trump was elected in the first place if so many people think he’s terrible. I explained the popular vote, the electoral college, Hillary Clinton and the ingrained sexism we as a nation exhibit. I told her that Hillary was not my first choice but she was selected to lead the party and too much was at stake for me to not vote for her. She asked me again who I plan to vote for this time around. I told her I’m voting for Joe Biden.
She questioned me — as she recognized that name was different than last time. It was not Elizabeth Warren anymore. I reminded her that we won’t always get our first choice but sometimes we have to vote for the person that best represents us, especially as the country is fractured. At the time, the running mate had not been selected. I was browsing through Twitter as we talked and saw Mayor Pete trending and that Senator Harris had unfollowed the Biden campaign making it seem as though she was out and maybe just maybe Elizabeth Warren would be announced.
I mentioned to her that Joe Biden announced he would be picking a female running mate to serve as his Vice President if he was elected, and that Joe was Obama’s Vice President. She was fixated on the idea of a woman being Vice President.
The conversation continued in the car on our way to baseball practice yesterday, only 30 minutes after the announcement that Senator Kamala Harris was announced. I felt like there was no better time to teach my kids about Shirley Chisholm.
I didn’t learn about Shirley in school. I attended a Catholic school from pre-school through high school, so it took me reading some “radical feminist propaganda” to even learn about her. Shirley was an educator, politician and author. She became the first Black woman elected to the United States Congress and served for seven terms. In the 1972, she became the first Black candidate for a major party’s nomination for President of the United States, and the first woman to run for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination. In 1984 Shirley co-founded The National Congress of Black Women with Dr. C. Delores Tucker. She even (posthumously) was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2015.
Shirley has been a hero of mine since I first read about her all those years ago. For me, most of my heroes fall in the political realm. As more women announced their bid I became overjoyed. Warren, Harris, Gillibrand, Klobuchar – all women that I could look up to, even if our beliefs didn’t always mesh. I immediately backed Elizabeth Warren. To me, she stood for what I believed in the most. Jay Inslee was second, Kamala Harris third. I knew I would back the person that was selected, but it was nice to see myself in a few of these candidates.
As news broke yesterday afternoon, my mind immediately went to Shirley Chisholm. She shattered so many ceilings on her way up, helping pave the way for women like Senator Harris. I wondered what she would think if she was still alive. Kamala is a trailblazer in her own right. Do we agree on everything? Most certainly not. But am I proud of her accomplishments and do I plan to support her? Yes, without a doubt.
There were some commonalities with Shirley that I noticed as I did my research. Kamala is the first Black woman to be elected district attorney in California history, first woman to be California’s attorney general, first Indian American senator, and the first Black woman and first Asian American to be selected as a running mate on a major-party ticket.
In my time of understanding politics and over the last decade of being able to vote, I’ve learned a lot. There won’t be a single candidate that I will unequivocally agree with unless I run for office. (I won’t because that would be a disaster.) But if I see myself in a candidate, agree with several issues really close to my heart and truly believe they will bring change, I will support them.
I hope we have the ability to come together and support Kamala when she needs us. I don’t think the descendants of King George III will take us back if Trump is reelected (and we probably don’t want a monarchy anyway) and I think we can agree that the dictatorship has gone on for too long now. It is time to stand up and rally for our first Asian American and Black woman to be our VP. Take back the power indeed.
Also, get your popcorn ready for the October VP debate. We watched gleefully as she made Brett Kavanaugh weep and now we can see her send Mike Pence crying home to Mother.