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  • I assume nearly half of the country hates her for being black and/or a woman, while some other large chunk of the country hates her for being "a cop." I think she's fine. She's done the job a hell of a lot better than a whole list of other VPs I could name. And since I'll be voting against Republicans no matter what, if a Biden-Harris ticket is the opposition I'll be checking that box. No problem.

  • Because she's black and she's a woman.

    Same reason why Hillary Clinton was widely respected every year except when she ran against a man.

    • Hillary Clinton was widely respected every year

      (source needed)

      Here's a list of objectionable stuff Hillary was involved with prior to running for president:

      • Hillary Clinton's hawkish stance on war, being more hawkish than Barack Obama and Joe Biden. She is specifically noted for advocating an escalation in Afghanistan​.
      • Clinton's involvement in the 2009 military coup in Honduras. Rather than condemning the coup, Clinton pressured other countries to recognize the new right-wing government, leading to increased violence and instability in the country​​.
      • The firing of seven employees from the travel office during the Clinton administration in 1993, an act that some critics attribute to Hillary Clinton's influence. The fired employees were later reinstated due to public pressure​.
      • Controversies surrounding her commodity trades from 1978 and 1979, in which she turned an initial investment of $1,000 into nearly $100,000. No official investigations were carried out, but the incident raised eyebrows and led to criticism​​.
      • Involvement in her husband's controversial pardons during his presidency, including those for the owners of a carnival company convicted of bank fraud​.
      • A controversy regarding gifts taken from the White House upon the Clintons' departure in 2001. Some items, worth $28,000, were meant for the White House estate and not as personal gifts for the Clintons. These items were returned after complaints from the donors​.

      • (source needed)

        Gallup used to poll her favorability pretty regularly, and until she ran for president in 2015 (from which she's never recovered) she seldom had an underwater approval rating. i'd say the characterization of wide respect is reasonably accurate given this data, although i don't agree with the poster's proposed causation

    • While this is certainly part of it (and all of it for a large number of people), I think it is overly simplistic view and disregards her past as a DA in which she enforced a draconian truancy program.

  • She's just incompetent. Look at some interviews with her, she can't answer basic questions and has done absolutely nothing as a VP. It has nothing to do with her being a woman or black.

  • Partly because of discrimination, partly because she lacks charisma. There are a substantial number of people that dislike her because she's a black woman and they have biases against both, sometimes without even knowing it. There are also some people on the left that dislike her because she's a moderate liberal that used to be a prosecutor. Honestly she's about standard as vice presidents come, so though I'm farther to the left than her I don't have any strong feelings on her.

  • This is probably the best breakdown of public perceptions of her record:

    A close examination of Harris’s record shows it’s filled with contradictions. She pushed for programs that helped people find jobs instead of putting them in prison, but also fought to keep people in prison even after they were proved innocent. She refused to pursue the death penalty against a man who killed a police officer, but also defended California’s death penalty system in court. She implemented training programs to address police officers’ racial biases, but also resisted calls to get her office to investigate certain police shootings.

    But what seem like contradictions may reflect a balancing act. Harris’s parents worked on civil rights causes, and she came from a background well aware of the excesses of the criminal justice system — but in office, she played the role of a prosecutor and California’s lawyer. She started in an era when “tough on crime” politics were popular across party lines — but she rose to national prominence as criminal justice reform started to take off nationally. She had an eye on higher political office as support for criminal justice reform became de rigueur for Democrats — but she still had to work as California’s top law enforcement official.

    Her race and gender likely made this balancing act even tougher. In the US, studies have found that more than 90 percent of elected prosecutors are white and more than 80 percent are male. As a Black and Indian American woman, Harris stood out — inviting scrutiny and skepticism, especially by people who may hold racist stereotypes about how Black people view law enforcement or sexist views about whether women are “tough” enough for the job.

    Still, the result is the same: As she became more nationally visible, Harris was less known as a progressive prosecutor, as she’d been earlier in her career, and more a reform-lite or even anti-reform attorney general. Now critics have labeled her a “cop” — a sellout for a broken criminal justice system.

    Sauce is Vox

  • as you can probably pick up from the responses so far: she gets all of the racism and bigotry you'd expect from being a visible minority public figure and all of the flack you'd expect from her fairly cringeworthy, not great track record as a politician. her core demographic is basically a slice of liberals who don't care that much about politics and enjoys the facade she puts on--and that's a small audience, politically. anyone who examines her track record more deeply will probably find a bone to pick with her, or is likely going to hate her because of her identity.

  • On the conservative side of the fence, she's black and Indian and most unforgivable of all, a DEMOCRAT!
    On the liberal side, she's taken a hard stance on crime, including minor drug offenses that probably shouldn't be crimes.
    She's got something for everybody! To hate!

  • I like her well enough. Would love another love affair like the obamas but that might be once in a lifetime kind of thing.

  • She’s an accomplished Black woman. That’s literally it.

    • Yeah. Right. Has nothing to do with her being some neoliberal cop who has a shit record from the left. It's because she's black. And a woman. Got it.

      • She has a great track record, both personally and professionally, if you had any interest in investigating it. Yes, even on cop stuff and leftist stuff — the details of which (including a lot of great social justice stuff, like trying to pass Federal laws against lynching and banning choke holds, racial profiling, and no-knock warrants) might surprise you.

        But people like you have no interest investigating. Because why bother? She’s an accomplished Black woman. May as well just call her a neoliberal and a cop and be done with it.

    • I don't like her because of situations like her truancy laws. If you think she's not liked just because of her race and/or gender, then you'll never understand why people don't agree with her.

      • I think she gets special criticism because of her race and gender. The level of hyperbole and toxicity around her is unique, though politicians like Hillary Clinton and Elizabeth Warren experience similar extremely emotional reactions. White male politicians with controversial policies don't get called "neoliberal" or "cop" in the same way that Kamala does; certainly some her policies are not great, but she's not really worse than equivalent politicians, and in fact she is way way better than a whole bunch of them.

        What do Hillary Clinton, Elizabeth Warren, and Kamala Harris have in common that seems to provoke such an extreme emotional negative reaction in their critics? Why is the reaction even worse towards Kamala?

        Hmm.

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