Kamala Harris announces 2020 presidential bid focused on priorities progressives will love

Screen capture by CNN via YouTube video

Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) announced Monday that she’s running for the Democratic presidential nomination and added that her “highest priority” is to protect special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.

As a former prosecutor, Harris definitely has the skills to do just that.

“My highest priority, and what I believe should be the highest priority, at least for the United States Congress, is that Bob Mueller be able to finish his investigation,” she said, in reference to the ongoing investigation into Russian interference and the alleged collusion between President Donald Trump’s campaign and Russia.

She added:

“Then we’ll make a decision. And certainly, that decision will be made in the courts, but it is also possible that decision will be made by the United States Congress.”

In announcing her presidential bid, she announced her intentions to unite voters and called on her fellow Democrats to be better listeners.

“For all voters, we’ve got to reach out to folks, we’ve got to go where they are, understand who they are, we have to listen as much as we talk and that’s certainly what I intend to do as a candidate,” Harris told reporters at a Monday press conference at Howard University in Washington, D.C.

One reporter, referring to her African-American and Indian heritage, asked her how she describes herself.

“I describe myself as a proud American, that’s how I describe myself,” Harris replied.

The former California Attorney General dismissed about whether she would be able to connect with rural voters and voters living in the middle of the country by noting she had once lived in Wisconsin.

“It is my full intention to travel this country and to sit in living rooms and to listen to families and let them express their concerns and their needs. And understand that … it is about representing all people of the country,” she said.

There’s been plenty of discussions that Harris could be a Democratic front-runner, but the primary field is getting crowded with many of her Senate colleagues either having thrown their own hats in the ring, and others being seen as other 2020 presidential possibilities.

Announcing her presidential intentions Monday on Good Morning America and during her press conference, Harris said she wants to focus on issues that unify the country.

“I’ve traveled our country and I know, again I know, that regardless of the state in which someone lives the core issues that are their concerns that weigh on them, that cause them to wake up in the middle of the night, are usually the same concerns,” she said.

Harris noted the U.S.’s diversity but also took the opportunity to take an apparent slap at Trump, urging Americans to repudiate voices that attempt “to sow hate and division.”

“When we emphasize that commonality, when we recognize that commonality, we will achieve greater unity,” she said. “And in particular greater unity than we have right now when there are so many powerful voices that are trying to sow hate and division among us. We’ve got to reject that.”

Harris has frequently gone to bat for Mueller’s investigation, asking tough questions of William Barr, Trump’s nominee for Attorney General William Barr and Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, during his confirmation hearing last year.

She was specifically concerned with whether Kavanaugh discussed the Mueller investigation with employees at Kasowitz Benson Torres, the law firm founded by Marc Kasowitz, Trump’s personal lawyer.

That connection between the Justice and Kasowitz could have established a link between Kavanaugh and the Trump administration, highlighting a potential conflict of interest regarding the Russia Probe.

You can watch Harris tear into Barr in the video below. And you can also watch her announce her presidential intentions in the video following that.

You can learn more about Senator Harris’s priorities, background, and platform on her website.

Featured screen capture by CNN via YouTube video