BBC:
Vice-President Kamala Harris has secured the support of a majority of Democratic delegates to become the party’s nominee for president.
A survey by the Associated Press on Monday evening said she had received the endorsement of more than the 1,976 delegates needed to win the nomination in the first round of voting.
That means Ms Harris is on course to be crowned the party’s standard bearer and take on Republican Donald Trump in November’s presidential election.
It becomes official when party delegates hold a roll call vote ahead of next month’s Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Chicago.
Delegates are people who are selected to represent their electoral area. Their pledges of support are non-binding until the vote but unlikely to change.
No-one has publicly stepped forward to challenge Ms Harris since President Joe Biden left the race on Sunday.
He found himself under mounting pressure from senior members of his party following his stumbling debate performance against Trump.
If the total holds between now and when delegates cast their votes, scheduled to take place from 1-7 August, Ms Harris would formally clinch the party’s nomination.
The survey by AP is an indication of the groundswell of support for Ms Harris after President Joe Biden dropped out of the race on Sunday.
Since Mr Biden’s announcement, millions of dollars in donations have poured into her campaign and leading Democrats have lined up to support her bid as the Democratic nominee.
Speaking to staff at her campaign’s headquarters in Wilmington, Delaware, on Monday evening, Ms Harris had Trump in her sights.
Referring to her early career as a prosecutor in California who took on predators and fraudsters, she added: “I know Donald Trump’s type.”
She said the Biden-Harris campaign had always been about two different versions of the future of the country – theirs and Trump’s.
“One focuses on the future, the other focuses on the past,” she said. “Donald Trump wants to take our country backwards… we believe in a brighter future that makes room for all Americans.”
She also noted Mr Biden’s accomplishments, saying her time serving as his vice-president was “one of the greatest honours of my life”.
