Kamala Harris has been using her cringeworthy 'unburdened' catchphrase for over a decade

Yet its meaning remains a mystery.

It sure looks like Vice President Kamala Harris is going to be stepping in for President Biden at any moment, as the Democratic establishment in Washington and on Wall Street has made it clear that they’re finished with America’s octogenarian commander in chief.

VP Harris doesn’t have much of a reputation as a master of rhetoric (to put it mildly), but that hasn’t stopped her from developing and constantly repeating her now-infamous signature slogan.

For many years, Harris has been trying to make the phrase, “what can be unburdened by what has been” her signature motto, to the point that she has also developed accompanying hand motions to be deployed while uttering the statement.

Harris has taken pains to try to force her “unburdened” motto into the public consciousness, advacing the phrase with the seeming hopes it would be applauded as a piece of profound rhetorical insight. Instead, her repeated use of “unburdened” has been highlighted by GOP operatives and commentators as material for the ultimate “cringe reel.”

After a pretty exhaustive search, The Dossier found that Kamala Harris has been using her “unburdened” motto for over a decade, which is much longer than previously understood.

We traced it all the way back to an April, 2013 speech that she delivered at UC Law San Francisco (Formerly UC Hastings) when Harris was Attorney General of California.

Her speech was the keynote for the law school’s future of privacy and innovation conference, and luckily, it is still available on YouTube. Although the YouTube video was listed in July, 2013 the conference took place on April 10 of that year, according to an old X post from the university.

Harris starts at the 11 minute market by talking about her mother.

“It was the work of watching her and her colleagues do, just be compelled to do, that which can be done unburdened by what has been,” she started.

Then AG Harris continued:

“Her job in life was two things: to raise her two daughters and end breast cancer. And nothing was going to get in the way of that. And that’s the kind of approach that you take to the work you do. It’s about being unburduned by what has been. Imagining what can be, in a way that will improve lives.”

For at least eleven years, Kamala Harris has insisted that we all become unburdened by what has been, whatever that means!