Daily US Times: Kamala Harris, the Vice President-elect who will be sworn in January 20, will resign her Senate seat on Monday.
Aides to the Ms Harris, a Democrat from California, confirmed the timing and said Governor Gavin Newsom was aware of her decision, clearing the way for him to appoint fellow Democrat Alex Padilla, now California’s secretary of state, to serve the final two years of Harris’ term.
Padilla will be the first Latino senator from the state of Californbia, where about 40% of residents are Hispanic. Newsom announced his choice in December, following intense lobbying for the rare Senate vacancy from the country’s most populous state.
Kamala Harris will give no farewell Senate floor speech. The Senate is not scheduled to reconvene until Tuesday, the eve of Inauguration Day.
Padilla’s arrival, along with Vice Preisdent-elect Harris becoming the Senate’s presiding officer when she’s sworn-in as vice president, is part of Democrats’ upcoming Senate majority. But the party still needs Sens.-elect Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff of Georgia to be certified as victors in their January 5 elections and then be sworn in.
Harris will be the first woman of South Asian descent and first Black woman to serve as US vice president, but her Senate departure leaves the chamber’s roster without a Black woman. She was just the second Black woman senator, winning her California election 17 years after Democrat Carol Moseley Braun finished a single term representing Illinois.
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