‘The Wire’ Star Wendell Pierce: Why It Is Vital to Vote for Kamala Harris

Wendell Pierce is a Tony Award-nominated actor who is known for iconic roles such as Bunk in the critically acclaimed TV series “The Wire,” Antoine Baptiste in “Treme,” and James Greer in “Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan.” He currently stars in the CBS series “Elsbeth.” Here, he explains why he plans to vote for Kamala Harris.

“When evil people plot, good people plan.” I still subscribe to this civil rights movement mantra, especially in the run-up to this most consequential of elections. We have less than 70 days to make an impact—for me, and other Vice President Harris supporters, it’s all hands on deck.

I like Kamala Harris because of her policies and economic plans, her determination to protect reproductive rights and to see through climate change legislation and an assault gun ban, and her plans to allow people the opportunity to purchase their homes. I know how important that was in my New Orleans neighborhood after Hurricane Katrina.

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My father passed away in November last year, aged 98. I was able to ensure he had around-the-clock care. Many people are not, and it’s important that older people, their loved ones and caretakers are able to access that care affordably, while also caring for their children and families.

During this administration funding was created to assist Americans caring for elderly parents, while also providing the child tax credit to assist with infant care. Harris will continue and improve upon these programs, providing policies and leadership in a comprehensive way that serves the American family in all its forms.

Harris wants to increase jobs and supplies of housing, and to protect the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare). She supports a bipartisan immigration bill to secure the border and reform the asylum process. The two can coexist: a secure border and fair immigration reform. She accomplished this bipartisan solution only to have Donald Trump wield his influence with Republicans senators to kill it.

In contrast to her, I believe he is a threat to democracy. A second Trump administration would oversee mass deportations and the purging of government workers to put Trump loyalists in place. His officials are crafting strategies to thwart the election under the guise of election protection, when they’re actually conducting election suppression. He also wants to eliminate the Department of Education, and that is anathema to me.

We even have some Republicans arguing that the Supreme Court’s 1857 Dred Scott decision means Harris should not even be a candidate. (That decision “held that ‘a negro, whose ancestors were imported into (the U.S.), and sold as slaves,’ whether enslaved or free, could not be an American citizen and therefore did not have standing to sue in federal court.”) It is disgusting. They’re saying Harris should not be considered a citizen; that we, as people of color, are not American citizens.

Black communities are always asked why they have historically supported Democrats in such large numbers. For your consideration: childcare, social security, Medicaid, Medicare, the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), the Voting Rights Bill protecting your right to vote and combat voter suppression, equal rights protections for women, marriage equality for LGBTQ people, $15 billion to Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), student debt relief, medical debt relief, and community development legislation that allowed Black entrepreneurs to combat lending discrimination and start businesses.

That’s why I vote for Democrats, and I tell people all the time: be selfish. “What will you do for me?” is a perfect question to ask of the parties and leaders who want your vote.

Ask the opposite question too: what won’t you do for me? The really offensive thing about the anti-abortion movement is that they’re replicating the 1865 Fugitive Slave Act, created as a mechanism to capture slaves in free states and return them to slave states. Today it’s a means of stopping women in places like Texas from accessing abortion in other states like California, and prosecute them. That’s the America Republicans want to bring us back to, and as our candidate says: “We’re not going back.”

The worst thing at a local level Republicans have done is let the “Empowerment Zones” in the inner cities, created by President Obama, sit dormant and create further urban blight. Now they’ve become tax write-offs.

We have to plan for the backlash that would happen if Harris wins. I fear there will be another Jan. 6—although this time it will be more organized. Trump and Republicans won’t need “fake” electors; they have put in place officials to ensure Trump wins and suppress people’s votes. We have to be vigilant about this and not naïve.

Harris was right when she said Trump was an “unserious man,” and the consequences of putting him back in the White House are, as she said, “extremely serious.”

Trump’s spewing of conspiracy theories and lies, and his general lack of character, makes for a strong contrast with Harris, who would be a serious president for all Americans. We should vote Harris as if our country depends on it—because it does.