Vice President Kamala Harris dropped an F-bomb on stage at an event Monday and urged Asian-Americans to demand opportunities in their professional lives.
“Sometimes people open the door for you and leave it open, and sometimes they don’t – and then you have to kick the damn door down,” Harris said during a roundtable discussion with comedian Jimmy O. Yang.
Harris then burst out laughing and briefly apologized for her use of vulgar language as the audience cheered and applauded.
Kamala Harris speaks at the Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies Legislative Leadership Summit
Kamala Harris struck a very different tone than her interview with Drew Barrymore earlier this month
“We should make t-shirts that say ‘kick down the damn door,’” Yang marveled as Harris continued to laugh.
The vice president spoke at the event, which was part of the Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies Legislative Leadership Summit in Washington, DC.
Harris’ comment was in stark contrast to the image she tried to portray on Drew Barrymore’s show earlier this month, after the host urged her to be the country’s “momala.”
‘I love Disney. However, Disney kind of screwed that up. You know, for a lot of us over the years, you know the bad stepparent,” Harris said with a laugh while talking about her stepchildren. “And their word for me is Momala.”
Kamala Harris speaks at the Emily’s List Gala
But Harris has a history of using and defending vulgar language in public.
“I was told you shouldn’t say motherf***ah in these types of interviews,” Harris said during a live podcast recording for the show Pod Save America in 2017, when asked to talk about then-President Donald Trump.
During her failed presidential campaign, Harris repeatedly referred to her “favorite curse word” which “starts with an ‘m’ and ends with an ‘ah.’
In 2019, Harris also defended Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) after proudly promising to “impeach the motherfucker” during a speech, referring to then-President Donald Trump.
“Honestly, my frank response is that she is not the first nor the last elected person to swear in public,” Harris said. said during an interview on The View.
At the event in Washington, Harris spoke at length about serving as the first vice president of both Black and Asian American descent.
“Breaking barriers doesn’t mean starting on one side of the barrier and ending on the other. There is breaking,” she said. “And if you break things, you get cut and you may bleed, and it’s worth it every time. Every time.’
Harris recalled her mother’s advice reminding her never to let people tell her who they are.
U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and head coach Kim Mulkey attend a ceremony for the Louisiana State University Tigers women’s basketball team
Vice President Kamala Harris delivers a speech to voters in Florida
‘Just tell me who you are. Never carry as a personal burden your ability to do what you dream of and what you aspire to based on other people’s limited ability to see who can do what,” she added.
Harris said Asian cultures taught the value of “duty.”
“There’s no question about it, it just is, and part of that is the obligation we feel when we’re the first to understand what that means for people who aren’t us, I mean, everyone else,” she said. .
Harris described the individual as the core of an onion and warned Asians not to downplay the importance of the individual.
“The individual is the core of the onion and there is the family, and there is the community and there is, and there is, and all those things are bigger,” she said.
She condemned “anti-Asian hatred” in the United States.
“The fear is everywhere, including of course in the Asian community,” she said.