By Dr. E. Faye Williams
Sometimes a writer has to figure out what to write about because it seems that not much is happening. Everything seems to be about the same old problems, but Vice President Kamala Harris stepped up for us as soon as we began asking, “Who will go for us?” In the history of Black people someone among us has answered that call. This time it’s Kamala Harris!
The Orange Man ran for his own good. He never accepted the fact that four years of him was a bit more than we could take. He never accepted the fact that he lost in 2020. He was in such disbelief that he tried to force the secretary of state in Georgia to come up with the number of votes he needed to win that state. We heard the telephone call where he thought nothing of speaking freely to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who stood firm against helping the Orange Man to illegally take votes he had not earned. That’s a crime, and to his cred- it, Mr. Raffensperger did not budge — so the Orange Man came up short and lost the state of Georgia.
We later learned some of his most loyal supporters had made an effort to seek other means of getting more votes for the Orange Man by taking them from other states by way of a brazen act of sending illegal representatives to ignore the true votes and make their own choices. I still find it such a brazen act to be carried out by so many of the Orange Man’s minions!
Well, here we are in 2024 and it looks like the Orange Man’s time is up. Vice President Kamala Harris stood up. She came to the game to run for President when President Joseph Biden decided not to run again. Vice President Kamala Harris was ready to answer the question, “Who will go for us?” Without hesitation she stepped up and said, “I’ll go. Send me Lord, I’ll go.”
She brought with her such joy, then called Gov. Walz, and here we are three weeks later and just three months to go until Election Day! You might say, Kamala stepped onto the stage in a bigger, faster way than we were accustomed to seeing. Kamala had already done that. We Black women and some of our best friends called a meeting, led by Jotaka Eddy, and on the first night of Kamala’s ascension to candidate for president of the United States, our Divine 9 and a lot of other “Black Women for Kamala Harris” stepped forward — nearly 45,000 of us and raised more money than many candidates raise in an entire election season to get Kamala started.
We then saw a meeting with Roland Martin called “Black Men for Kamala.” I stopped counting the men on the call, but it exceeded those who came forward the first night of Kamala’s campaign. They were followed by “White Dudes for Kamala Harris.” Then came “White Women for Kamala Harris,” “Asian Women for Kamala Harris.” Unions came on board. Hispanics came on board.
Kamala immediately began her opening act and shortly thereafter, she brilliantly chose a candidate for vice president in the person of Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota. He joined her to bring even more joy to the ticket. Together they began a campaign tour with such excitement as one we had not seen before (except for Barack Obama’s).
Kamala Harris and Tim Walz brought joy back to campaigning, and crowds grew and grew no matter where they went to hold rallies. It’s clear as Kamala asks, “Are you ready to fight?” The crowd roars back in the affirmative, and she assures them, “When we fight, we win!” Fighting means we VOTE November 5, 2024!
Dr. E. Faye Williams is national chair of the National Congress of Black Women, Inc. Contact her via www.nationalcongressbw.org.
