First-term U.S. Democratic Senator Kamala Harris of California, a rising party star and outspoken critic of U.S. President Donald Trump's immigration policies, launched her 2020 campaign for the White House on Monday.
Harris, 54, the daughter of immigrants from Jamaica and India, enters the race with the potential advantage of being the Democratic candidate who looks most like the party's increasingly diverse base of young, female and minority voters.
"I have the unique experience of having been a leader in local government, state government and federal government," she said in an appearance on ABC's Good Morning America.
The former California state attorney general has become popular with liberal activists for her tough questioning of Trump administration appointees and officials, including Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh and former Attorney General Jeff Sessions, during Senate hearings.
Her campaign will focus on reducing the high cost of living with a middle-class tax credit, pursuing immigration and criminal justice changes and a Medicare-for-all healthcare system. She has said she will reject corporate political action committee money.
Lupita Nyongo presents an award to Kamala Harris onstage at the 2018 Glamour Women of the Year Awards: Women Rise in New York City, U.S., November 12, 2018. /VCG Photo
Harris' campaign will be based in Baltimore, with a second office in Oakland, California. Her slogan will be "For the People," in a nod to Harris' roots as a prosecutor, aides said.
She will hold a launch rally in Oakland before the end of the month.
As one of the earliest congressional critics of Trump's immigration policies, Harris has pushed hard for a deal to protect from deportation those immigrants who came to the country illegally as children, a group known as Dreamers.
Harris is the fifth Democrat to enter an increasingly crowded battle for the nomination to challenge Trump, the likely Republican candidate.
She and other Democrats will have to navigate the party's debate about whether an establishment figure who can appeal to centrist voters or a fresh face who can energize its increasingly diverse and progressive base offers the best chance to beat Trump in 2020.