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US Vice-President Kamala Harris has passed the threshold to clinch the Democratic presidential party’s nominee.
National Committee Chair, Jaime Harrison, said on Friday that this has cemented the vice president’s rise from running mate to standard bearer.
Join our WhatsApp ChannelPrime Business Africa reports that Harris emerged presidential candidate of the Democratic Party on Friday after securing the majority of delegates’ votes in a virtual roll call.
According to online reports, speaking by telephone, Ms Harris said she was “honoured to be the presumptive nominee” as the virtual roll call continues ahead of the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Chicago later this month.
Ms Harris is the first black woman and first South Asian woman to become the White House standard-bearer for a major US political party.
If she defeats Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, in November she would be America’s first female president.
She ran unopposed in the virtual roll call after President Joe Biden stepped aside last month and quickly endorsed her. Several potential rivals followed his lead.
Ms Harris on Friday afternoon, formally became the nominee after securing the support of 2,350 delegates, the threshold required to earn the nomination.
“We believe in the promise of America and that’s what this campaign is about,” she said in brief remarks by phone as she crossed the benchmark.
“We are in this, we are on the road and it’s not going to be easy, but we’re going to get this done.”
In total, Democrats have said 3,923 delegates – or 99% of the participants – plan to vote for her.
The roll call began on Thursday and ends on Monday.
Ms Harris, 59, was born in Oakland, California, and is the first Democratic nominee in the party’s nearly 200-year history to hail from a western state.
If she defeats Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, in November she would be America’s first female president.
