WASHINGTON – As a young college student, Kamala Harris made the nearly 3-mile trip from Howard University to the National Mall to protest against apartheid in South Africa.
In 2017, as a senator, she returned to her alma mater to deliver the commencement address.
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In July, when she received word that she would be likely be the Democratic presidential nominee, she was wearing her Howard sweatshirt in the vice president's residence.
Howard, one of the nation's best known historically Black colleges, has been central to Harris' origin story, and now, as she seeks to become the first woman elected president, the university is having a capstone moment.
The school has produced luminaries like Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, whose legacy inspired Harris to attend Howard, and author Toni Morrison, among others. Some at the university see Harris' elevation as vice president as another validation of one of the school's core missions of service.
“There’s clearly a direct relationship between Howard and its relationship to democracy and the democracy that we envision, one that is practiced in a way that includes all of us,” said Melanie Carter, the founding director of the Howard University Center for HBCU Research, Leadership and Policy.
If Harris won the White House, she would be the first woman elected president and the first graduate of a historically Black college to hold that office. With many HBCUs, like a number of liberal arts colleges, struggling financially, her ascent has bathed Howard in a positive light.
“It empowers students to reach farther than what they thought was possible,” said Nikkya Taliaferro, a senior at Howard University from Honolulu who said the 2024 presidential election will be her first time voting. “Even if she doesn’t win, she’s already made such a big impact and I know for all of us, that alone, is unforgettable.”
To Stefanie Brown James, a Howard alumna and co-founder of The Collective PAC, which is working to increase Black political representation, said that for Howard, the rise of Harris underscores “all the pieces fitting together. At this moment, she is the personification of the leadership, the excellence, the global responsibility to service, that Howard represents.”
In her 2017 commencement address, Harris said Howard taught her to reject false choices and steered her to public service. In her memoir, she wrote that Howard taught that there is an expectation that students and graduates would “use our talents to take on roles of leadership and have an impact on other people, on our country and maybe even on the world.”
In an Instagram post where she looked back on her time at Howard, she wrote, “Along the way, Howard taught me that while you will often find that you’re the only one in the room who looks like you, or who has had the experiences you’ve had, you must remember: you are never alone."
Earlier this year, she wrote in a Facebook post that the investment in HBCUs is an investment “in the strength of our nation for years to come,” when she welcomed Howard’s men’s basketball team to the White House as the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference champions. HBCUs have historically struggled to generate investment, despite recent influxes in funding and donations, causing them to flounder financially.
Rep. Summer Lee, D-Pa., a Howard Law graduate, said Howard’s “each one, teach one camaraderie” shaped how many alums in politics tackle the job. “It allowed us to root for each other in ways that I would not have gotten at another institution,” Lee said. “Those guidelines of being a social engineer, not being on the sidelines, and creating public policy, that’s rooted in the experiences of the most marginalized people. That is a Howard trait.”
The Howard network is also providing some financial and organizational support to Harris' campaign. The Collective PAC utilized its HU Bison PAC, which held a virtual call for graduates with more than 4,000 attendees and raised over $150,000, according to James. The Bison PAC plans another call on Wednesday.
On campus, a group called Herd for Harris is campaigning to support her. Other student-led organizations are mobilizing students to register to vote and be engaged around presidential debates and policies that could most affect them.
“It was instantaneous and that’s just Howard,” James said. “Something’s happening, we need to respond to it, so we get to work. It’s simply a Howard thing.”
Even though Harris enjoys broad support on campus, there are students who are challenging Harris over policy, notably the war in Gaza.
“What we expect of Kamala Harris in this election is really derived from the morals that Howard instilled in us, that we are an oppressed people, and that we also need to advocate for oppressed people abroad,” said Courtney McClain, a student senator at Howard who met Harris in 2020. She said she plans to support Harris, while holding her accountable.
With the November election drawing near, Harris has been on extensive campaign travel and prepping for her first debate against Republican Donald Trump — including a mock session at Howard — on Sept. 10. Still, she made time to speak to crowd of Howard’s largest incoming first-year class in front of Cramton Auditorium.
Using a bullhorn, she told them that she was proud of them and urged that they enjoy this moment.
"You might be running for the president of the United States,” she said to roaring cheers.