DENVER — Colorado Democratic leaders and political action groups are shifting their support to Kamala Harris following President Joe Biden’s announcement yesterday that he is dropping out of the race and endorsing his Vice President to take his spot.
Colorado Governor Jared Polis and all seven U.S. Congressional Senators and Representatives from the state are endorsing Harris.
“The Democrats needed something to mix it up, and we got it. We got a vibrant, exciting experienced, young candidate with a vision about the future of our country,” said Governor Polis in a CNN interview this afternoon.
“We’ve got the entire Colorado delegation supporting Vice President Harris, all of our members of Congress. We are so excited here in Colorado,” he said.
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Many Colorado state and local politicians are also endorsing Harris, including State House Representative Leslie Herod.
“The energy right now is electric,” Herod said. “There is finally excitement in this race.”
The announcement comes just one month before the Democratic National Convention, where the party’s presidential nominee will be officially selected, and four months before the November election.
“It is going to be a very tough race in a very short amount of time,” Herod said. “Nothing is guaranteed.”
However, Herod, who supported Harris in her 2020 campaign and has met the Vice President several times on her trips to Colorado, said she is confident Harris is up to the challenge.
Herod said she asked Harris how she handles the scrutiny of political life. “She looked at me and told me, when you break glass ceilings, you get cut. Do it anyways, because it matters.”
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Herod said Harris’ policy positions closely align with what matters to Coloradans. She pointed to Harris’ views on workers’ rights, paid family leave, LGBTQ+ rights, and women’s issues.
“As a woman, she understands issues that matter to us, woman to woman, we've seen her fight for things like reproductive health care, access to abortion, maternal mortality,” she said.
Colorado’s Democratic party delegates will vote tonight on whether to endorse Harris. Herod, one of those delegates, said she plans to support her.
"When you break glass ceilings, you get cut. Do it anyways, because it matters."
“Within hours of her announcing, not only did she assume the $90 million war chest [of political donations made to the Biden campaign], she also raised $50 million in less than a day,” Herod said.
Last night, more than 40,000 Black women across the United States joined a phone call to discuss how they could help Harris become the nation’s next president. Herod was on that call, which she said crashed several times because of the interest from so many callers.
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“Within hours of that call happening, we were able to raise over a million dollars, just as Black women supporting Kamala Harris as our presidential nominee,” she said.
Bianka Emerson, who leads Colorado Black Women for Political Action, a nonprofit organization aimed at bringing “the strength and perspective of the Black woman” into Colorado politics, was also on that call.
“We are ready. We're fired up and ready to go,” she said. “I'm expecting boots on the ground. I'm expecting a huge turnout … for the blue ticket this year.”
Emerson said, “It’s exciting to see how things have evolved historically.” While Black Americans didn’t gain the right to vote until 1965, and the nation’s first Black president wasn’t elected until 2008, she said, “This country is long overdue for a woman to lead.”
She sees Harris, a woman of color, as capable of bringing people together.
“I really hope that she represents a unification. We are extremely divided. We live in an era of misinformation and disinformation,” Emerson said. “I am ready and willing to do whatever is needed to make sure that she wins.”
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