Kamala Harris has yet to be nominated by the Democratic Party, but the question is already being asked: Who will be her running mate for the presidential election on November 5? Just a few hours after Joe Biden announced his withdrawal, American media began speculating on who would make up the other half of the Democratic ticket.
Time is of the essence: There must be a period of vetting before the name is made official. Senator Tim Kaine, Hillary Clinton's 2016 vice presidential nominee, detailed the typical selection process during a call with journalists, as the New York Times reported. In his case, it consisted of "two months of scrutiny of taxes, all taxes I’ve paid, every speech I’d ever given, every article I’d ever written. Deep, intense interviews with my whole family."
This process will necessarily be shortened, and will concern only a limited number of vice presidential candidates. Eric Holder, who was the attorney general under Barack Obama (2009-2015), and his law firm are in charge of conducting background checks on potential vice presidents.
Harris' team plans to conduct and conclude the vetting process by August 7. Ohio election law requires candidates to be registered and certified by their party 90 days before election day to be on the ballot.
One thing is certain: The vice president's choice will reflect what she sees as the best path to gathering the 270 Electoral College votes that would enable her to become the 47th president of the United States, and the first woman to become president. And it is clear that the favorites are mainly White men from swing states in which Biden was struggling against Donald Trump. Le Monde takes a look at the names mentioned.
Three names keep coming up. First, Josh Shapiro, the governor of Pennsylvania: He was elected with a landslide victory in 2022, defeating Republican Doug Mastriano. On Monday, Shapiro did not deny having talked with the vice president, nor did he say he would turn down the role if she offered it to him. Pennsylvania, with its 19 Electoral College votes, remains one of the keys to entering the White House: In 2016, the state handed victory to Trump before swinging back to the Democratic side and choosing Biden in 2020.
Roy Cooper, the governor of North Carolina, is also a serious contender: He was a state attorney general, like Kamala Harris, and his state is the only swing state Biden lost in 2020. Moreover, the current president was trailing in the polls there against Trump. Cooper was narrowly elected for the first time in 2016 by just over 10,000 votes; he was reelected in 2020. Limited by law to two consecutive terms, he cannot run for a third term and is therefore available.
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