‘She’s part of the plan’: Kamala Harris makes critical pitch as South Carolina primary kicks off

Vice-president's trip to the state signals she is vital to the campaign because of her ability to galvanise Black voters and her abortion rights messaging

Joe Biden's closing argument on Friday to South Carolina, the state that rescued his White House dreams four years ago, was not made by Joe Biden. Instead it was Kamala Harris who strode out under a brilliant blue sky to the thunderous cadence of South Carolina State University's drumline.

It was because South Carolina's voters showed up in the middle of a historic pandemic that Biden became president, she told a modest but enthusiastic crowd in Orangeburg, and I am the first woman and first Black woman to be vice-president of the United States".