Presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden announced he is selecting Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) as his vice president pick.
“I have the great honor to announce that I’ve picked [Harris]—a fearless fighter for the little guy, and one of the country’s finest public servants—as my running mate,” he wrote in an announcement on Tuesday.
“Back when Kamala was Attorney General, she worked closely with Beau,” his deceased son, Biden added. “I watched as they took on the big banks, lifted up working people, and protected women and kids from abuse. I was proud then, and I’m proud now to have her as my partner in this campaign.”
With just six days until the nominating convention, Biden was expected to choose a vice president this week.
Before becoming a senator from California, Harris was the state’s attorney general and San Francisco’s district attorney before that. She also unsuccessfully ran for president before bowing out earlier this year and endorsing Biden.
Biden’s selection of Harris, 55, provides racial diversity and gender diversity in an attempt to appeal to a broader spectrum of the Democratic Party. Harris’s mother was a breast cancer researcher who immigrated to the United States from India in the 1960s, while her father Donald Harris, originally from Jamaica, is an economist who worked for Stanford University in the Bay Area and a staunch Marxist.
It also means that Harris would take over as president if Biden, 77, suffers a health issue while in office. Earlier this year, Biden told reporters that “I’m an old guy,” and he would need someone who could “immediately” take over.
“Look, I thank God I’m in great health. I work out. No, I’m serious. You know, I work out every morning. I’m in good shape—knock on wood, as my mother would say,” he said in January of this year.
Notably, Harris was a co-author of the Democrats’ police reform legislation in the Senate in response to civil unrest, protest, and riots in the wake of George Floyd’s death.
Some have also considered her a more moderate member of the Democratic party, earning plaudits from across the aisle.
In May, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) told radio host Hugh Hewitt about her: “I think she’s the leading candidate [for Biden’s running mate]. I know her. I didn’t like what she did in the [Brett] Kavanaugh [Supreme Court confirmation] hearings by any stretch of the imagination. But she’s hard-nosed. She’s smart. She’s tough.”
But Harris’ record as California attorney general and district attorney in San Francisco was heavily scrutinized during the Democratic primary and turned off some liberals and younger black voters who saw her as out of step on issues. She tried to strike a balance on these issues, declaring herself a “progressive prosecutor” who backs law enforcement reforms.
Biden, who spent eight years as President Barack Obama’s vice president, has spent months weighing who would fill that same role in his White House. He pledged in March to select a woman as his vice president, easing frustration among Democrats that the presidential race would center on two white men in their 70s.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
