Biden’s choice of Kamala Harris for VP ‘a wonderful moment in American history,’ Booker says

Cory Booker worked closely with fellow U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris on anti-lynching legislation and on making changes to policing following the death of George Floyd. He competed against her for the Democratic presidential nomination.

And he cheered Joe Biden’s decision to choose her as his running mate, making her the first Black woman on the national ticket of a major political party.

It was welcome news at a time when Americans have taken to the streets in unprecedented numbers to protest the killing of unarmed Blacks at the hands of police, when Blacks are disproportionately dying of the coronavirus, Booker said.

“It is for me, on a very personal level, I feel like our ancestors are rejoicing,” Booker told NJ Advance Media just hours after Harris’ selection.

“I’ve heard from hundreds of people now on my different platforms, folks who are not all that political, but just expressing what it means to be personally to see this getting done. And I just am so personally fulfilled by this and inspired by this and I just feel this profound sense of joy at this choice.”

Just as Barack Obama broke barriers as the first Black president and Booker himself broke them as New Jersey’s first Black U.S. senator, the Biden-Harris ticket itself is a historic first.

“It’s incredibly valuable to have the first ticket in the history of this country that has both gender and race diversity at a time in America where we are discovering ourselves and really trying to truly be a multicultural democracy in the full sense of what that means,” Booker said.

“It’s really a wonderful moment in American history,” he said.

In Harris, Biden chose someone who not only has worked to craft important bills but has the ability to build the coalitions needed to pass them into law, Booker said.

“When it comes to the details, when it comes to actual crafting legislation and putting it together, she is brilliant in the inner negotiations that have to go on,” Booker said. “She combines that incredible inside game with being a charismatic leader that can inspire crowds.”

“She has that rare combination of the ability to not only create great legislation and to negotiate important advancements but then also sell those ideas, to inspire people to embrace change and hep lead us toward the kind of the larger coalitions that are necessary to ensure progress.”

Booker argued while running for president that he was the candidate best to attract the minority voters who stayed home in 2016, resulting in President Donald Trump winning Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

He said Harris has an even greater ability to do this, because she also can appeal to Asian Americans, part of her background, and women.

“Harris has a broad reach,” Booker said. “I think she will excite and energize African American voters in an extraordinary way. Remember she already shown she can be elected by the most populous and diverse state. She’s a woman who’s going to energize Asian Americans, as she is herself. She’s somebody whose going to energize women voters.”

During the race for the Democratic nomination, both Booker and Harris went after Biden on race relations and criminal justice issues as they tried to peel away the Black voters that were key to his early lead in opinion polls and their inability to break through.

Booker, for example, criticized Biden’s advocacy of the 1994 crime bill that led to the mass incarceration of Blacks, while Harris hit him over his opposition to busing to integrate schools.

Booker said Biden’s decision to select Harris was another indication that the former vice president understood the importance of addressing those issues.

“Biden really does get it,” Booker said. “He has a team around him that knows that at this moment in history, it’s realty urgent to deal with issues of mass incarceration it’s really urgent to deal with issues of racial justice and equity.”

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Jonathan D. Salant may be reached at jsalant@njadvancemedia.com.

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