The annual convention is being held this week at the George R. Brown Convention Center.
HOUSTON — Vice President Kamala Harris will be making a stop in Houston on Thursday to speak at the American Federation of Teachers Convention.
The annual convention is being held this week at the George R. Brown Convention Center with an estimated 3,500 attendees. The labor union with an estimated 1.8 million members has officially voted to endorse Harris for President.
“I wanted to cry because I feel like it’s that time. I feel like we women are natural born caregivers, and we care about the world, and I feel like she is the one,” said Jessica Campos with Community Voices for Public Education.
As excited as Campos is, she does have some differences of opinion with Harris on hot-button topics like border security.
“We need to pay attention to the way we are allowing people into the country,” Campos said.
“The Dems are going to put forward someone who is vital and gonna campaign well, will hopefully raise the right kinds of issues, there is a lot of hope in that,” said Jesse Sharkey with the Chicago AFT chapter.
“We as women have to come out and stand and fight for her,” said Kim Phillips from the St. Croix AFT chapter.
We asked Phillips about critics who say being a man or woman shouldn’t matter, and that the candidate should be the most qualified person.
“Most of the opinion will say not a woman, even though it depends on qualification, but over the years as you see some people who ain’t qualified has been president before,” Phillips said.
While the convention is only open to members, those who want to hear what Harris has to say now that she is a presidential candidate can stream her remarks here in this story and on the KHOU 11+ app on Roku, Fire and AppleTV.
A time for her speech has not been released, but the AFT Convention schedule for Thursday says a general session and installation of officers will begin at 9 a.m.