Kamala Harris' Achievements and Failures as US Vice President

Kamala Harris’s meteoric rise as Joe Biden’s replacement as the Democratic presidential nominee in 2024 is the most dramatic seismic shift in presidential politics in recent U.S. history. Yet many Americans would be hard-pressed to name a few policy accomplishments during Harris’s vice presidency. That’s because she has focused her efforts on issues that don’t get much attention from voters. But Kamala Harris hasn’t been idle.

Photo: Gulsina Shaina | Dreamstime.com

The second person in office was forced to remain in the shadow of the first person of the state. Harris had a lot of responsibility, some things even went well, but she did not cope with all the tasks with flying colors.

Immigration

Biden tapped Harris early in his term to help address the crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border. It took her months to make her first and only visit to the area, a delay that drew backlash from lawmakers in both parties and a barrage of hate from some media outlets. Harris has since borne the brunt of Republican criticism as the border crisis has worsened. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) sent buses of asylum seekers from the border to the vice president’s home in protest.

On the subject: About taxes, borders and Trump: what Kamala Harris said at the Democratic convention

There is much to criticize, but it is worth recognizing that Harris is trying to address the root causes of the immigration problem. Her response to immigration problems was the creation of a public-private partnership, Central America Forward (CAF). The idea behind CAF is to create jobs in Central American countries in order to slow the flow of mass migration to the United States.

CAF has raised more than $5,2 billion since its launch in 2021, and its partners include more than 50 companies and organizations committed to supporting economic growth in Central America.

There are no results yet, but let's hope that the idea will work in the long term.

Voting rights

Harris was at the forefront of the administration's efforts to secure voting rights protections across the United States, pushing Congress to pass the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.

The main objectives of the law include:

1. Restoring Federal Oversight over changes to voting rights laws in individual states, particularly those with a history of voting rights abuses. That oversight was weakened by the 2013 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Shelby County v. Holder.
2. Expanding Access to Voting by creating stricter standards to prevent discrimination against voters based on race or national origin.
3. Ensuring transparency in the procedures for changing election laws and regulations at the state and local government levels.

In 2021, the bill failed to get the 60 votes needed to overcome a Republican filibuster, preventing debate on the Senate floor where Harris could cast the tie-breaking vote in the evenly divided chamber.

Harris, among other things, was at the forefront of the administration’s efforts to codify voting rights protections. To achieve that goal, she “helped build political coalitions with civil rights leaders, put external pressure on Congress, and communicated privately with lawmakers.” Ultimately, her work “hit a wall” when Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and now-Independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.) rejected proposed changes to Senate procedures to stop Republican filibuster.

In this area, Harris's work was a complete failure; she failed to advance and pass a single voting rights bill.

Abortions

Abortion rights have become a central issue for Democrats since the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn them at the federal level. During the 2022 midterm elections, Harris pledged to protect reproductive freedom and abortion rights, meeting with legislators in at least 18 states to discuss the issue. When Biden announced his 2024 run, Harris gave a fiery speech at a rally for reproductive freedom at her alma mater, Howard University, criticizing “extremist leaders” for passing restrictive abortion bans.

Harris has continued to make abortion a focus of her work this year. In March 2024, she visited a Planned Parenthood clinic in Minnesota that provides abortion services. The White House said it was the first time in U.S. history that a president or vice president has visited a clinic that provides abortion services. The tour was the sixth stop on her “Fight for Reproductive Freedoms” tour, which she launched in January to push for greater access to abortion following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn federal abortion rights.

Harris's actions ultimately did not lead to any specific abortion decisions or laws. But she did do a lot to advance the cause of reproductive freedom.

Maternal health

In her previous role as U.S. Senator from California, Harris introduced the Protecting Mothers' Rights Act and the Momnibus Black Maternal Health Act, which would direct cross-agency efforts to improve maternal health, particularly among racial and ethnic minorities, veterans, and other vulnerable populations.

The Vice President's previous work on maternal and infant health was a key component of the Recovery and Improvement Act of 2022, which expands access to maternal health care and makes new investments to reduce mortality and illness.

The results of work in this direction are difficult to assess. The law is quite new, and there are no official statistics on changes in maternal mortality rates for the two years it has been in effect.

Gun violence

In September 2023, Biden created the first-ever White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention, overseen by Vice President Harris.

This Authority was created by the Safer Communities Act 2022. This Act:

• prohibits persons under 21 years of age from purchasing firearms;
• gives the Justice Department additional authority to prosecute arms dealers;
• provides school-based mental health services to assist youth affected by gun violence-related trauma and grief;
• funds community-based programs to end violence.

Again, the initiative is correct, aimed at solving a very painful problem for the United States. But the results are not yet visible. For example, on September 4, a 14-year-old schoolboy in Georgia killed two children and two teachers and injured nine more people. The saddest thing is that he spent a year threatened to do it, and the police knew about his threats.

Expanding Broadband

In 2023, Harris and Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo traveled to Kenosha, Wisconsin, to announce the production of new electronic equipment, made possible by the Biden-Harris administration’s Investing in America program and bipartisan infrastructure legislation.

The bipartisan infrastructure act requires the use of American-made materials and products in federally funded infrastructure projects to create hundreds of new American jobs. The act includes an unprecedented $65 billion investment to expand affordable and reliable high-speed internet access in communities across the U.S.

“Our investments in broadband infrastructure create jobs in Wisconsin and across the country, and they expand access to reliable high-speed internet so that everyone in America has the tools they need to thrive in the 21st century,” Harris said.

Let's be fair: the law is great, and the idea of ​​creating jobs in the United States is great. But Harris's merit in this process is debatable: the law is bipartisan, meaning it was passed by both parties in Congress, and Harris was simply involved in the process of implementing it as a representative of the Biden administration.

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juneteenth

In 2021, President Biden declared Juneteenth a federal holiday, often referred to as Second Emancipation Day. On this day in 19, 1865 Union soldiers arrived in Galveston, Texas, to proclaim the emancipation of African-American slaves by proclamation of President Lincoln. This was two years after the actual signing of the Emancipation Proclamation, a time when travel took a long time. Harris is one of the authors of the bill.

"As a U.S. Senator, I was proud to co-sponsor legislation to make Juneteenth a federal holiday," she said.

Conclusions

During her 4 years as Vice President, Harris did not sit idle and worked in several areas. But it is impossible to single out any particular achievements. Her supervision of immigration policy ended in failure (at least that is how it looks now); gun violence, despite the law, also failed to stop; in other areas, Harris proposed and spoke a lot, but concrete decisions were never made.

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