Yesterday, Power 106 Radio aired Senator Kamala Harris’ in-depth interview conversation with host and producer Nick Cannon. The discussion focused on Senator Harris’ history fighting for criminal justice reform, her pursuit of justice for the voiceless and vulnerable, the racial wealth gap, and what Cannon is hearing from listeners about the presidential race. During the lightning round, Cannon even asked Senator Harris to name her most prized possession, favorite album of all time, which three things she’d bring on an island, and more.
Key highlights from the interview with Power 106 Radio Nick Cannon:
On Senator Harris background securing rehabilitation for young people in the criminal justice system: “I created new programs that were about saying that young men arrested for drugs should be given jobs, or should be put in substance abuse treatment and not prosecuted, saying that young women that were arrested for prostitution as teenagers should not be called prostitutes. They should be called sexually exploited youth. And instead of putting them in juvenile hall, we should create a safehouse. Which I did. So those young women were not criminalized for what had been a life in foster care or other situations where they were being preyed upon or bought and sold. Being in a position of authority, I didn’t have to ask anybody permission to do these things. I just did them.”
On demanding justice for grieving black mothers as DA of San Franciscos: “When I was in that position, the experience I had often included: A black mother coming to the front window of the office saying I wanna talk to Kamala, I only wanna talk to Kamala. And the receptionist would say there’s another mother here. And I would take that mother into my office and she would sit on my couch and cry, and talk about how nobody was taking the death of her baby seriously, her adult son. That had her son died in a car accident or maybe cancer, people would respect her grief. But instead, they were looking at her like she should have expected that, because that was a statistic. And she would say to me, I want somebody to 1. find the person who did this to my son. I want justice for my son. And I want to be treated with dignity as a grieving mother, and not a statistic.”
On pioneering criminal justice reform as a prosecutor: “I chose to go in. You can talk to so-called progressive prosecutors across the nation, especially those who have been elected in the last decade, and they will tell you: that at one time or another, they looked to what Kamala Harris was doing as a model of what could be done. In fact, the Obama Justice Department designated my work years ago, as a model of innovation for reforming the criminal justice system.”
Her plans to close the racial wealth gap through enabling homeownership: “Let’s talk about the racial wealth gap. Black families own 1/10th of the wealth of white families. One of the specific areas for me in closing that racial wealth gap is homeownership…part of why I’m running is to put $100 billion dollars into historically redlined communities, families who are living there and into families who are living in federally subsidized housing, to give them help with downpayment and closing costs to buy a home. Why is that important? That is one of the best ways you can lift up the economic status of families, black families in America.”
Why she’s running for President now: “One of the reasons I’m running for president is to fight for justice. It’s about economic justice, the criminal justice system, and we can go down the list about all of the things that are play in this election. But folks have got to vote…there is so much on the line right now. We have got a racist in the White House who is also a criminal. Let me clear about that. And I know what I’m talking about, look: this is a time when you do want a prosecutor running for President. There is a criminal in the White House. And nobody is above the law, including the President of the United States.”
Watch the full interview.