When five-year-old Kamala Harris boarded a bus to take her to her first day of kindergarten in 1969, she was at the centre of a raging national debate.

The Harris family lived in western Berkeley, a predominantly black part of the northern Californian city. The bus drove her across town to a school in a far more affluent — and white — Berkeley neighbourhood.

Fifty years later, she would confront her political rival Joe Biden about her experience.

"There was a little girl in California who was part of the second class to integrate her public schools, and she was bused to school every day," she said to her future running mate.

"And that little girl was me."

In that moment, she exposed the stark difference between them.

While a young senator Joe Biden was spending the 1970s debating the merits of a federally mandated order to transport black children to desegregate schools, Harris was riding the bus.

Now they are the next president and vice-president of the United States.

Biden returns to the White House with a promotion, but Harris enters the building breaking barriers.

She will be the first woman, first Black person, and first South Asian American person to become US vice-president.

"Throughout our nation's history, [women] have paved the way for this moment tonight," Harris told voters during her victory speech on Saturday night local time.

"Women who fought and sacrificed so much for equality and liberty and justice for all.

"Including the black women who are often, too often, overlooked, so often prove they are the backbone of our democracy."

Read more:

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-11-09/kamala-harris-makes-history-as-first-black-woman-vice-president/12860318

The Creeping Trumpweed part of the toon from MAD Magazine more than 30 years ago...

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