Kamala Harris and her husband Douglas Emhoff during the campaign.
Vice President-elect Kamala Harris is a first in many ways: the first woman, the first black person and the first Native American to hold the position.
Her husband, Douglas Emhoff, will also make history. He will be the first man and the first Jewish person to serve as the husband of a president or vice president. Harris is a Baptist.
And everyone from political strategists to racial justice activists are waiting to see if these firsts will be mere symbolic victories or the start of a radical change in gender and race relations and the launch of a coalition. sustainable democracy.
Symbolism alone is important. Strategists say black women are the backbone of the Democratic Party. They vote in large numbers, help endow his volunteer efforts and bolster his victories in key races, but they have not always been well represented among his candidates or in his political decisions.
In an interview with CBS’s “60 Minutes” last month, Harris vowed that she would bring her diverse perspective to the Biden administration.
“What I am going to do, and I promise you this and this is what Joe wants me to do, that was part of our deal, I will always share with him my lived experience in regards to any issue we are facing.” , she said. “And I promised Joe that I would give him that perspective and that I would always be honest with him.”
This experience includes being the daughter of an Indian immigrant and a father born in Jamaica. She was raised biracial and interfaith. She is a Christian, but also attended Hindu temples with her mother.
This side of Harris’ story could help galvanize voters of Asian-American descent, the fastest growing racial or ethnic group in the United States that Democrats and Republicans have tried to woo.
This experience also means being the first to graduate from a historically black college in such a high position. Harris studied at Howard University in Washington and is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha, the country’s oldest black sorority. Members have attended its events and have been active donors, many donating $ 19.08 to mark the year the group was founded.
Harris, 56, didn’t hesitate to use his experience as a touchstone for awareness. She has attended virtual campaign events with South Asian celebrities such as actress Mindy Kaling, comedian Aasif Mandvi and former US lawyer and Trump antagonist Preet Bharara.
And she played a leading role in Biden campaign ads targeting both black and Asian American voters, including one that featured words in Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, Tamil, Hindi and Filipino.
Cheryl Hori, founder of Democratic consultancy firm Pacific Campaign House, said that as the highest Asian-American elected official in U.S. history, Harris has a huge opportunity to help Democrats rethink their approaching a group of politically influential voters who have often been overlooked. .
“It will be historic for Asian Americans, period,” she said. “It’s a situation where all the ships are rising. Even if you’re not Indo-American, it’s a great achievement.”
But Hori said these voters came from very different backgrounds and did not always see their interests as intertwined, noting that immigrants from Pakistan and India, for example, did not see themselves as the target audience for advertisements aimed at Asian Americans. She said Harris could help educate Democrats with Asian voters in places like Pennsylvania, Texas, Wisconsin and Michigan.
Harris’ husband will also have the opportunity to lead by example. Emhoff could be a role model for boys and men or take an active role in promoting key issues.
Ronald F. Levant, co-author of “The Tough Standard,” said Emhoff had previously shown a different path for men by stepping back from his own career as a successful corporate lawyer to support his wife. . While the vice president’s wife often doesn’t receive the same kind of attention as the first lady, Levant said Emhoff would gain more attention just because he was the first man to hold the post.
This could give him the opportunity to tackle some of the issues facing young boys, Levant said, particularly if he works with President-elect Joe Biden, who has also modeled a very different form of masculinity from that of his opponent, President Donald Trump, in the election. .
“It was an election where masculinity was very much present,” said Levant.
And in case all of those firsts weren’t enough, Emhoff, also 56, also gained attention because of his religion, with Jewish magazine Forward calling him “our big Jewish crush” and The Times of Israel. calling it the “Democrats”. new Jewish star. Some Jews have even noted that the nickname of their stepmother of her children – ‘Momala’ – is close to the Yiddish word ‘mamele’, which means ‘little mother’.
