Indian-origin Senator Kamala Harris has launched her 2020 presidential bid on Sunday with a scathing criticism of President Donald Trump's policies, saying that the US is at an "inflection point" in the history due to the attack on democracy like never before.
Harris, 54, who was elected to the Senate in 2016, announced her run for presidency last week. She has been voted on top of the list of Democratic leaders aspiring to defeat Trump in the November 2020 election.
Harris, the second African-American woman elected to the US senate, has drawn comparisons to Barack Obama since early in her political career.
"We are at an inflection point in the history of our nation. We are here because the American dream and our American democracy are under attack and on the line like never before," she said.
When we have leaders who bully and attack a free press and undermine our democratic institutions, that's not our America, she said, without mentioning Trump's name.
She criticised "the arrogance of power she saw in wealthy bank executives after the foreclosure crisis, and said that Americans needed to be honest about the country's problems with racism, sexism, anti-semitism and transphobia.
She also emphasised unity, praising the amazing spirit of the American people and pledging her desire to be a president, echoing former president Abraham Lincoln's famous words, Of the people, by the people, and for all people.
Pointing to Trump's xenophobic rhetoric, his policies at the border, and his decision to shut down the government in a failed attempt to get funding for his controversial plan to build a wall along the US-Mexico border, she said, "People are trying to convince us that the villain in our American story is each other."
"But that is not our story. That is not who we are."
"Of course, we know this is not going to be easy guys. We know what the doubters will say is that they always say, they'll say it's not your time. They'll say, wait your turn. They'll say, the odds are long. They'll say, it can't be done.... But, America's story has always been written by people who can see what can be unburdened by what has been... that's our story."
Alleging that too many black and brown Americans are being locked up for mass incarceration, she called for drastic repair of criminal justice system. "Let's also speak the truth that too many unarmed black men and women are killed in America."
Disclaimer: No Business Standard Journalist was involved in creation of this content