Senator Kamala Harris.
(cheers and applause)
Welcome to the show.
Thank you.
-Happy birthday.
-Thank you so much.
This really is a birthday
for me, uh,
because you have come out
of the gate firing.
In fact, Donald Trump,
apparently said
you were the best opening
so far.
That's what he said.
He was like,
(mimics Trump):
"She was great. So great.
Came out firing."
He likes big crowds.
(normal voice):
He does, but I mean,
if even he was impressed,
what do you think
you've done right
to begin your journey
as a presidential candidate
for the Democrats?
Well, I that, um, coming out
of the gate speaking truth
about how America really needs
a fighter
for truth and justice
in this country
-which are right now
under attack. -Right.
Truth and justice
are under attack.
I think it's about also fighting
for the opportunity America
that's lost for so many people.
But coming out of the gate
in Oakland, California,
the place of my birth,
and talking about, um,
the fact that we are better
than this as a country,
and I think we all know that,
and we want folks
who are gonna fight
for the best of who we are.
So it's been a good beginning,
it's been a strong beginning,
and I hope to continue
on this path.
That's exciting.
It's an exciting journey.
-Exciting beginning.
-(cheers and applause)
Um...
Since this is the beginning,
and, you know, I read the book,
and I've learned so much
about you now.
There are so many things
that people do want
to know about you.
I think the most important is
how do people pronounce
your name?
Because people argue about this
all the time.
Is it "Hah-ris"
or is it "Ha-reece"?
(laughs) It's Harris.
No, but seriously,
everyone goes like,
"Is it 'Kah-mala' or is it
'Ka-mah-la' or is it...?"
Kamala. Just think of a comma
and then add a "la."
-They-- Oh. Kamala.
-There you go. Kamala.
-I like that. It's like a long
"a." -There you are.
And what I didn't know
from the book
is that you grew up
in a household where--
for the most part of your life
you were raised by a single
mother who is Indian,
-but she raised you
in black America. -Yes.
You know, you went to
civil rights speeches,
you went to marches with her.
Has that shaped a lot
of how you see the world,
growing up in a household where
you were in a black community
but at the same time, had
multiple cultural influences?
Well, it's true. I mean,
you and I were both raised
-by very strong mothers,
you know. -Right.
My mother was all of five feet
tall, but after meeting her,
you would have thought she was
seven feet tall.
And my mother was one of
the smartest, the toughest,
and the most loving people
I've ever known.
And she was a fighter.
She was a breast cancer
researcher.
She had two goals in her life:
-to raise her two daughters
and end breast cancer. -Wow.
And she would take us to the lab
with her on the weekends
and after work, and her whole
vision of life,
and I adopted that vision,
was of what can be, unburdened
by what has been.
Knowing what can be in a way
that we improve human condition,
and seeing, even though
we have not seen it before,
seeing the potential in human
beings and in our future.
And that's how our mother
raised us.
And she was active
in the civil rights movement,
that's where my parents met.
You know, we joke that we grew
up surrounded by a bunch
-of adults who spent full time
marching and shouting -Right.
about this thing called justice.
And, um, and my mother knew
that she was raising
her two daughters into a world
that would present obstacles,
and would not necessarily
get us,
but my mother raised us to
understand, and she would say,
"Don't you let anyone tell you
who you are.
-You tell them who you are."
-Wow.
And, um...
-Thank you.
-(cheers and applause)
I always wondered...
I always wondered, I mean,
you know,
I know that you love
your country,
and I know that there is
oftentimes a call
that people feel to-to-to,
you know,
ascribe to-to a larger goal,
you know,
-I want to be president.
I want to be that. -Yeah.
But why did you want to get
into this line of work?
I mean, you know,
to have a mom
who's trying
to cure breast cancer,
and you go, no, I want to go
into being a district attorney.
I want to go into public office.
Why?
Well, when I was growing up
in that environment.
It was a very rich environment.
It was an active environment.
And the heroes in the
civil rights movement,
among many were the lawyers.
It was Thurgood Marshall,
and Charles Hamilton Houston,
and Constance Baker Motley.
And these individuals
who understood the skill
of the profession of law
to translate the passion
from the streets to the
courtrooms of our country.
And do that work
of reminding folks--
and we know it must
continually be done--
reminding folks of the promise
we articulated in 1776:
that we are all and should be
treated as equals.
And so I decided that's the work
I wanted to do,
that that was noble,
important work.
And I went to law school,
and then out of law school,
I made the decision to become
a prosecutor.
And I will tell you,
you can probably imagine--
my sister went on, for example,
to head the ACLU--
When I made a decision
to become a prosecutor
folks thought it was
a curious decision.
Yeah, I can imagine.
With some of my family,
I had to defend the decision
like one would a thesis,
but what I said--
-Truly.
-(laughter)
But what I said is that
when we want to reform systems,
and I was born knowing
the failures,
and-and the problems
with the criminal justice system
in America.
But I also believed then,
as I do now,
that when we want to reform
these systems
that need and must be reformed,
that we have a role to play
on the inside
-as well as on the outside.
-Right.
And so that's
the decision I made.
And it was a decision to be able
to then do things
as I did when I was D.A.
I was elected the first woman,
and the first woman of color
to be district attorney
of San Francisco.
And the first woman of color
in the state of California.
-Right.
-When I was then later...
Thank you.
When I was later elected
attorney general of California,
I was elected as the first woman
and the first person of color
ever to be the attorney general
of the biggest state
in the country.
And in that position,
having the power
that comes with the position,
I was able to champion reform,
um, like-like had
really not existed before.
When I was district attorney,
Trevor, of San Francisco,
I started a reentry initiative
focused on young men
-who had been arrested
for drug sales. -Right.
Getting them jobs and counseling
and then dismissing the charges
against them.
This was back in 2004,
when I became D.A.
People would say to me,
"Why are you letting people out
when you should be
locking people up?"
People would say to me--
I would talk to other D.A.s--
"This is a smart way
to do business."
We need to stop
the revolving door.
Let's-let's incorporate
and embrace
-that concept of redemption.
-Mm-hmm.
Right? The idea people,
when they make mistakes,
they should be held accountable,
but let's let them earn
their way back. Right?
You know this. This is what
Mandela talked about so much.
-Right.
-Right?
And, so, I would start
these programs.
I'd talk with other D.A.s.
"Hey, let's do
reentry initiatives."
They'd say, "What is reentry?
What does that mean?
"That's not our job.
"Our job is not
to get people services.
Why are you getting people jobs
when they've committed crimes?"
I'd say, "Because it's
the smart thing to do.
"Plus, the war on drugs
was a complete failure,
and we need to have a different
approach to how we do business."
Let's-let's talk a little bit
about that different approach.
-(cheering and applause)
-The, um...
The journey you've been on
has been unique
-because you started
as a prosecutor. -Right.
You were in a position where
you had to put people in prison.
-You had to enforce the law.
-Right.
But you've come under criticism
recently
where people say, um,
you had some programs
that some feel
targeted minorities
or communities
that didn't have the means.
You know, for instance,
truancy programs
where mothers were threatened
with prison
because their children
weren't going to school,
weren't where
they were supposed to be.
When you look at your past...
I know what
you're proposing now,
but what do you think
was the biggest thing
that changed the way
you saw criminal justice reform?
Do you think
it's just a time thing,
or do your views continue
to evolve as you learn?
Well, okay,
first let me say this.
I will never regret
having prosecuted
people who molested children,
people who raped women,
people who murdered
other individuals.
Those are serious crimes
for which I believe
-there should be
serious punishment. -Mm-hmm.
And I'm never gonna apologize
for that.
And I think
most people would agree
that when one human being
harms another human being,
especially those who are weak
and vulnerable,
that there should be serious
and severe consequence
and accountability.
We also know,
and I was born knowing,
that this system
of criminal justice
in this country needs reform.
It has been biased.
There is systemic racism.
We have had a policy in place
in this country
that has led
to mass incarceration
where we have incarcerated
more people per capita
than any other civilized
or-or advanced,
so-called advanced country,
and it needs to be reformed.
I will say to you
that over the years,
one of the benefits that
I believe the system received
and that helped me do the work
that I was able to accomplish
was because of
the incredible activism
and smart activism of folks
like the folks
who are Black Lives Matter,
the folks who were involved
on the outside
saying and demanding
that the system would change.
Demanding and marching
and advocating,
because that activism allowed me
to then be able to do some
of the work that I accomplished.
I could not have done
anything that I did
without that level of organized,
smart activism on the outside.
And we have thankfully evolved,
but there's a lot more to do.
-Right. -There's a lot more
to do. I believe, first of all,
that we have got to continue
on sentencing reform.
We have a Department of Justice
led by this administration
that has shut down
consent decrees
where there should be
supervision
of police departments
that have proven to be engaged
in racist or in-in...
in systemic kind of targeting
-of people of color.
-Right.
Um, this administration
has shut down
the pattern
and practice investigations
of police departments
around the country.
They're engaged in a pattern
and practice of discrimination.
-We've got to change what we're
doing right now. -How do you...
Let me ask you this.
How do you change that
as a commander in chief
and leader of the country
while still making police
and people who love the police
feel like you are a candidate
who believes in law and order?
'Cause that's-that's one piece
of framing
that President Trump
has done exceptionally well,
is he's gone and said
the Democrats love crime.
The Democrats hate police.
So how do you say to the police,
"Hey, we're going to
come after you, essentially,
"for the things that you've done
wrong, but at the same time,
-we still respect
the police force"? -Yeah.
How do you balance that?
Well, it's...
In my mind, it's simple.
But I agree,
he has created this false choice
and this paradigm that suggests
that he really doesn't
understand who communities are.
When your grandmother's house
gets burglarized,
when you have a family member
who has been victimized,
you want to know that you
can be able to pick up the phone
and call police
and they're gonna be there.
-Mm-hmm. -And so it is a mistake
and a myth to suggest
that certain communities
don't want police.
They do. What they don't want
and what no community
should want
is excessive force,
racial profiling
and-and unequal application
or enforcement of the law.
-Right.
-But...
-(applause)
-So we have to really...
we have to reconcile
these points.
And, in fact, that's why
when I was attorney general,
one of the issues
that I worked on--
and we created the first
of its kind in the nation--
training for police officers
on implicit bias
and procedural justice.
And brought together
leaders in law enforcement
as well as leaders
in civil rights communities
to say,
"Look, we have got to deal
"with the fact
that when you carry a gun,
"when you have the ability
to enforce the law,
"which means
to pull somebody over,
"to stop them, to arrest them,
"you got to check
where the bias is kicking in,
"and you got to recognize
that it's there
"and that if we're not
gonna deal with it,
"there's gonna be
uneven application of the law,
and injustice results
because of that."
And, so,
there is work to be done,
but we have to have
an understanding, also,
that this president
has suggested
that so many issues are issues
about national security
and public safety that are
a figment of his imagination,
and, um, including the vanity
project called the wall
and his suggestion
that there are terrorists
who are invading the country
and, for that reason,
suggesting
that we should have
a concrete wall from sea to sea.
