President Joe Biden suspended his reelection campaign on July 21 and almost immediately endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris as his successor for the top spot on the ticket. The grassroots response has been particularly electric. That night, #WinWithBlackWomen kicked off what became an amazing series of Zoom calls paired with online fundraising. There have been huge calls uniting so many groups—Black Men, white men, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, white women, South Asians, Native Americans, LBGTQ+ groups, cat ladies (with and without children), and so many more—around the former prosecutor, attorney general, and senator from California.
One of the latest groups starting to organize? Caribbean Americans.
Harris identifies as both Black and South Asian. Her father, scholar Donald J. Harris, is a Jamaican immigrant and naturalized U.S. citizen, making Harris one of the more than 3 million Americans of Caribbean-West Indian heritage. The largest group are Jamaican Americans, with the largest communities in South Florida and the New York City metropolitan area.
And Caribbean women, like Shirley Chisholm, have long played a key role in our political history, and others continue to do so in all areas—from making laws to covering them.
Caribbean Matters is a weekly series from Daily Kos. If you are unfamiliar with the region, check out Caribbean Matters: Getting to know the countries of the Caribbean.
