Washington
CNN
—
Vice President Kamala Harris delivered the keynote address at Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Inc.’s biennial convention on Wednesday, offering a call to action to Black women voters, aiming to mobilize a key demographic during a crucial week for the Biden-Harris reelection campaign.
“I believe this is the most meaningful and most consequential election of our lifetimes, sororities. This is serious business,” Harris told thousands of sorority members at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center in Dallas.
“And at this moment, our country is again looking to the leaders in this room to lead us, to inspire us, to organize us, to mobilize us, to get people registered to vote, to get to the polls in November, because we know when we organize, mountains move. When we mobilize, countries change, and when we vote, history is made,” she added.
Ms. Harris has deep ties to AKA, the nation’s oldest historically black sorority – she was a member of it while attending Howard University – and its members were some of her most ardent and vocal supporters throughout her political career, especially during Mr. Biden’s presidential campaign four years ago, before he won the nomination and selected Ms. Harris to run with him.
Black women are credited with helping Biden win the presidency in 2020 and have been Biden’s biggest supporters since he was vice president under Barack Obama. But the timing of his speech at this year’s AKA 71st Boulevard Convention is particularly significant because Biden’s support has slumped due to his handling of Israel’s Gaza war, persistent concerns about the 81-year-old president’s age and mental health, and ongoing worries about the state of the economy.
Harris’ appearance comes as she visits several states this week, including Nevada and North Carolina, in hopes of rallying key bases including Black, female and younger voters following Biden’s lackluster debate performance.
Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority’s annual event is held every two years and invites members from around the world to attend certification training, forums, workshops, community service projects and other events. In an Instagram post, the sorority said Harris will deliver a keynote address to more than 20,000 members in Dallas.
The post touches on one of the sorority’s core programs, “social justice advocacy,” which includes voter education, voter registration, mobilization and candidate forums.
“Harris’ keynote address allows us to continue the work of our international program initiative, ‘Social Justice Advocacy,'” the sorority wrote. “Alpha Kappa Alpha is bridging the gap to empower and equip our community with knowledge, support and tools through advocacy and social justice.”
Harris said AKA is “a big part of who I am,” highlighting the role Black women played in helping Biden win the White House in the last election.
“Alpha Kappa Alpha leaders have stood up, spoken out and worked hard to build a brighter future for our country and, of course, in 2020, at the peak of the pandemic, they helped elect Joe Biden as president of the United States and me as the first female vice president of the United States,” she said.
Some sorority members who attended Boulle’s rally were eager to hear the vice president speak on Tuesday.
Glenda Baskin Glover, former international president and CEO of AKA, said she expects Harris to discuss the Biden administration’s record of supporting abortion rights, funding for HBCUs and student loan forgiveness.
Glover, a former president of Tennessee State University who serves on Biden’s HBCU advisory council, said Harris’ speech will be crucial in mobilizing sorority members to vote.
“The right to education is on the ballot and certainly the right of a woman to choose what to do with her body is on the ballot,” Glover said. “I’m sure she’ll talk about what the Biden administration has done over the last three and a half years to advance women and minorities.”
Janae Dandridge, an AKA member from Detroit, said she thinks Harris and the Biden administration understand the voting power of sororities.
Dandridge said if Harris wants to build credibility with the Biden campaign, she needs to talk about the importance of uniting the country in this divisive political climate, reproductive rights and fighting for social justice.
“At the end of the day, we’re a very large organization, a powerful group of women who are all around the country and the world and can go and vote,” Dandridge said, “And it’s not just us, we have our family and friends who can empower other people to go and vote. We can make a difference in elections.”
AKA is an international organization of more than 360,000 graduate and undergraduate members. It is the oldest Greek-letter organization founded by college-educated black women. AKA was founded at Howard University in 1908.
Gurinder Carr, a member of AKA and president of Higher Heights for America, a political group that promotes black women’s political participation, said black women should not be overlooked in this election.
“I always say that when a Black woman is passionate about making sure that her community has access to resources and is focused on the issues that she cares about, she doesn’t actually go to the polls alone. She takes her home to her neighborhood, her church, her sorority and her union,” Carr told CNN.
She added that Harris “needs to be re-energized to continue to fight the good fight on the issues we care about. It’s important that (young undergraduates here) realize their leadership potential, right? You can’t be invisible.”
The speech comes at a critical time for the vice president: Ms Harris has emerged as a front-runner to succeed Mr Biden if he decides to step down before November (he has repeatedly said he will not), but she has remained a staunch supporter of the president ever since minutes after last month’s disastrous debate.
“I’m not going to spend the whole night talking to you about these 90 minutes because I’ve watched the performance over the last three and a half years,” she told CNN’s Anderson Cooper immediately after the debate.
According to her aides, Harris met with elected officials last week to voice her support for the Biden-Harris pairing and urge them to maintain party unity.
On Wednesday, the vice president praised the administration’s achievements on several policy issues, including health care and the economy, and also announced in his speech that the Biden administration has established national health and safety standards for maternal care.
“For the first time, we have a national health and safety standard for maternal care. This first-of-its-kind national standard means that nearly every hospital in our nation will soon be required to provide mothers of newborns with a delivery room equipped with life-saving medical equipment,” Harris said.
But despite the administration’s efforts, Harris stressed that “there is still work to be done,” particularly on gun violence prevention, voting rights and women’s reproductive freedom.
Harris’ team has been told by senior officials to stay the course and stay quiet amid the turmoil within the party, but some Democrats are pushing for her name to be considered for the party’s nomination.
CNN previously reported that during a conference call on Sunday between House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and House Democratic leaders, there was widespread agreement that Harris should be the nominee.
During a moderated conversation over the weekend with Caroline Wanga, president and CEO of Essence Ventures, Harris did not address growing concerns about Biden’s candidacy and instead outlined the importance of the upcoming election and a second term for Trump, a remark she reiterated on Wednesday.
She also argued that Trump would push for a nationwide abortion ban if re-elected in November.
“We will not forgive him. We will not let him do that. We have worked and fought so hard for too long to watch our daughters vomit in a world with fewer rights than their mothers. America must trust women. America must respect individual choice. America must protect freedom,” she said.
Harris denounced Project 2025, a plan by conservative groups to fundamentally change the federal government and the lives of Americans if Trump is re-elected.
“Trump’s advisers have developed a 900-page blueprint for a second term,” Harris said, as the audience shouted out the name “Project 2025” in unison.
She continued, “This bill includes plans to cut Social Security, eliminate the $35 cap on insulin, abolish the Department of Education and end programs like Head Start. So let me be clear: this is a blatant attack on our children, our families and our future.”
This story was updated Wednesday with additional developments.
