Former Vice President Joe Biden said he would choose a woman as his running mate if he wins this year’s Democratic nomination for president.
Biden made the comment during Sunday night’s very unique Democratic presidential debate on CNN against U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders. The independent Vermont senator, for his part, wouldn’t definitively commit but said, “In all likelihood, I will.”
Biden has previously said he would seriously consider naming a woman or a person of color as his running mate.
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Biden has a chance to deliver a knockout blow to Sanders on Tuesday, when four states — including hugely important Florida — are holding presidential primaries. Unless Sanders can pull off an upset in either the Sunshine State, or in Ohio, Illinois or Arizona, the race will all but be over when Georgia’s postponed presidential primary rolls around May 19.
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A record number of women launched presidential campaigns in 2019, but all except Tulsi Gabbard have since dropped out. That basically leaves the Democratic race to two white men well into their 70s. Walter Mondale was the first White House nominee from either party who chose a woman to be his running mate in 1984, former New York Rep. Geraldine Ferraro.
GOP White House nominee John McCain picked Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin in 2008.
Here are some names to consider:
Stacey Abrams from Georgia. The first name that comes to mind and the one that just won't go away. Even though she lost Georgia's governor's race to eventual winner Brian Kemp in 2018, Abrams has been widely seen as a candidate for higher office, even president. Most recently she was linked as a possible U.S. Senate challenger but has since said she is not interested.
Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. As governor of a state that Donald Trump narrowly won in 2016, Whitmer could help Biden's campaign in his efforts to return Michigan blue. Whitmer campaigned hard for Biden during his recent Michigan primary win and also delivered the Democratic response to Trump's State of the Union address.
U.S. Sens. Kamala Harris, Amy Klobuchar, Kirsten Gillibrand and Elizabeth Warren. All were Democratic presidential candidates in this current cycle, and Klobuchar endorsed Biden immediately after the South Carolina primary. Harris has also endorsed Biden, but Harris' California is almost certain to vote Democrat this fall, making her value to the ticket questionable.
For her part, Warren hasn’t endorsed anyone after rumors persisted she would throw her support to her ideological counterpart, Sanders. Warren would bring a definitive ideological leftward tilt to Biden’s mostly centrist campaign.
Gillibrand has been one of the leading, most outspoken advocates for the #MeToo movement and could bring Biden’s campaign into that national conversation.
U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard. Lest anyone forget, Gabbard is still in the race, even though she hasn't been able to qualify for any of the recent debates and isn't polling anywhere close enough to be considered a serious White House contender. She's also at war with Hillary Clinton and recently filed a multimillion-dollar defamation lawsuit against the last Democrat who tried to take on Trump. Would Biden choose someone who has run afoul of the Clinton machine? Or would he see Gabbard as a chance for the party to finally break free from one of the Democrats' most public faces?
Former Attorney General Sally Yates. Another Georgia connection, Yates was fired by Trump less than a month into his tenure. Yates, then the nation's acting attorney general, told the U.S. Justice Department not to enforce the president's controversial temporary immigration ban on seven majority Muslim countries. Yates has since become a Biden supporter.
Also Sunday night, Biden repeated a previous pledge to nominate an African American woman to the U.S. Supreme Court if given the chance to do so as president.
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