Sen. Kamala Harris drops out of presidential race, Morgan community weighs in

Sen. Kamala Harris drops out of presidential race, Morgan community weighs in

Donethe Cyprien and Oyin Adedoyin

Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Ca.) announced on Tuesday that she was dropping out of the presidential race due to lack of financial resources in a statement. 

“I’m not a billionaire. I can’t fund my own campaign. And as the campaign has gone on, it’s become harder and harder to raise the money we need to compete,” she said.  

According to the Center For Responsive Politics, a non-profit political research group, Harris has raised approximately $22 million compared to Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Former Vice President Joe Biden (D-Del.) who’ve raised approximately $60 million and $65 million respectively. But the Morgan community had mixed feelings regarding the presidential candidate’s withdrawal. 

Daniel Chukwu, a junior political science major, said he had never supported Harris’ campaign. 

“I didn’t necessarily appreciate how she was going about winning,” Chukwu said. “It was just a real open way [of] her trying to grab the black vote too rigorously and too openly.”

Political analyst Jason Johnson said Harris’ decision to drop out was on brand with her campaign. 

“What this whole thing blows down to is she couldn’t raise money anymore,” Johnson said. “It had always been difficult for her to raise money because she is a woman and she’s black and just the network of people she could tap into weren’t as high.” 

He added that, for Harris, tapping into the resources of the Democratic state of California is different compared to competing on a national level against 27 other candidates. 

“It’s different when you’re running across the country,” he said. “It’s different when you got to tap into the same New York, Atlanta, Chicago [and] Houston networks of donors.” 

Moving forward, Aaron Quartey, a junior political science major, is interested in seeing Harris’ role beyond the 2020 election. 

 “I would like to see what she does outside of the election and outside of her campaign,” he said.