US Vice President Kamala Harris’ First Tweet Says…

Kamala Harris is of Indian and Jamaican descent (File)

Kamala Harris made history on Wednesday as she was sworn in as the first woman, first Black and first Asian American vice president of the United States. The former California Senator’s first tweet from her US government account as the holder of the second highest office in the country’s administration consisted of just three words, but delivered the intended message forcefully. “Ready to serve,” she wrote.

Ready to serve.

— Vice President Kamala Harris (@VP) January 20, 2021

Apart from her personal Twitter account – which has over 15 million followers and whose description swiftly changed to the ‘Vice President of the United States’ after the oath, the 58-year-old has also been operating the official US government account since she became the president-elect last year.

Ms Harris, who is of Indian and Jamaican descent, was sworn in by US Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor.

Her becoming the vice president of the United States is being seen as a milestone in the long struggle for gender and racial justice across the world.

Ms Harris, who had said in her first speech as the vice president-elect that she would be the first woman to hold the post but not the last, on Wednesday shared on Twitter a moving tribute to her Indian mother and all the “women who came before me.”

“I’m here today because of the women who came before me. And to the woman most responsible for my presence here today – my mother, Shyamala Gopalan Harris, who is always in our hearts,” Kamala Harris says as snapshots of her family and her campaign flit across the screen.

I’m here today because of the women who came before me. pic.twitter.com/ctB9qGJqqp

— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) January 20, 2021

Ms Harris, who began her career as an attorney in the nineties, is known for breaking glass ceilings. She was the first Indian American to serve as a US senator and the first woman of colour to have been elected district attorney of San Francisco. When she was elected as the Attorney General of California in 2010, she was the first woman and first Black American to do so.

With inputs from agencies