Audiences welcomed former Vice President Kamala Harris back in D.C. with a thunderous standing ovation, as she entered the Warner Theatre stage to talk about her book “107 Days.”
In a conversation between Harris and journalist and podcaster Kara Swisher, the vice president offered an overview of the “shortest presidential campaign in modern history,” as described in a video trailer played to introduce the evening.
However, it was more than a reflection on last year’s campaign. Harris and Swisher dug deep into current political challenges and how they are affecting Americans and various industries.
“Can our system of government survive three more years of this?” Swisher questioned.
The former vice president offered a chilling warning.
“I think we can be candid with all the friends here. I don’t know that it won’t get worse before it gets better,” she said. “I don’t have the solution for how it stops.”
Health care and medical research were major topics of discussion, rooting back to the vice president’s family history.
“I am the daughter of a mother who was a scientist. The goals in her life were to raise me and my sister Maya and to end breast cancer,” Harris said. “When I see what these people are doing now, to deny science and fire scientists, it’s personal for me.”
Howard University student Naomi Jefferies attended the event as a reporter for The Hilltop, the institution’s newspaper, founded by Zora Neale Hurston.
While she was covering the event, Jefferies was also happy to hear from the barrier-breaking former vice president, who graduated from Howard in 1986.
“She gave us a lot of really valuable information about the current state of our country and the future of our country,” said Jeffries, an English major from West Orange, New Jersey. “It seems like the fight seems fleeting at times, but she really instilled that we need to keep pushing and keep fighting.”