Is Harris Obliged to Choose a White Man as Running Mate?

Photo: Brendan Smialowski Agence France-Presse Vice President of the United States and likely Democratic presidential candidate in November 2024, Kamala Harris. There are growing calls among lawmakers in Washington, strategists and organizers across the country for the woman of black and Indian descent to choose a white man as her running mate

Ashley Parker – The Washington Post and Dylan Wells – The Washington Post

Published at 12:00 am

• United States

As soon as it became clear that Kamala Harris would be the likely Democratic presidential nominee, a joke emerged on social media: images of various “whites”—white wines, white paint swatches, white crackers—with captions suggesting that they were Kamala Harris’s choices for a possible vice president.

“Kamala’s VP options,” someone wrote on the X Network, above a series of cream paint swatches labeled “Safe Whites: Our Top 40 Whites.” “Kamala is looking for a VP,” another wrote above a shelf of white wine bottles labeled “Interesting Whites.” “Kamala’s menu of potential VPs,” wrote a third above a menu with descriptions ranging from “light and crisp dry whites” to “rich whites.”

Even the TV show Daily Show got in on the act, using a photo of Kamala Harris receiving a call from then-candidate Joe Biden in 2020 informing her that he had chosen her as his number two, with the caption, “Hello, am I at the Midwestern White Male Warehouse?”

If the tone was tongue-in-cheek, it also reflected the opinion that solidified almost instantly among lawmakers in Washington, strategists and organizers across the country, and ordinary voters: Kamala Harris, who is of Black and Indian descent and who, if elected, would make history as the first woman president, should choose a white person as her running mate—and preferably a white man.

It remains unclear who Harris would choose as her No. 2. While the list of potential candidates is stacked with white men—Gov. Roy Cooper of North Carolina, Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona, and Gov. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, to name a few—a few more diverse options, such as Gov. Wes Moore of Maryland and Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, have also emerged.

For decades, no one cared about two men at the top of the ticket

— Debbie Walsh

But the degree and speed with which the conventional wisdom has taken hold—that if she wants to win, Kamala Harris must choose a white man as her vice president—reflects, at its most cynical, the fact that the nation will tolerate no more than some deviation from its white male foundation, even though the political world as a whole is more diverse than ever.

“It’s not surprising that conventional wisdom is that if we put a woman at the top of the ticket, there’s—and I put that in quotes—‘balance,’ which is always part of the equation,” says Debbie Walsh, director of the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University.

But when it comes to a barrier-breaking candidate, Walsh adds, a sense of continuity with the past often becomes more important.

“For decades, no one cared that there were two men at the top of the ticket. For decades, no one cared that the two people at the top of the ticket were white,” she says. But in these moments when a first is on the horizon, I think it is good to reassure people, to make them believe that the world is perhaps not changing so quickly, to see at least this kind of “balance” — again in quotation marks — between the sexes and the races.”

In interviews at Harris’s first major campaign rally Tuesday near Milwaukee, many of her supporters said they expected her to choose a white man as her running mate, believing it would give the ticket broader appeal.

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Betsy Rowbottom, 53, an interior designer in Milwaukee, said she would like to see Sen. Cory Booker, who is black, or Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who is gay, as her vice president, but she doesn’t think either has a chance.

“I think it’s going to be a straight white man from a swing state. A balanced ticket, if you will.” “I think that's what people will want,” Rowbottom said.

Colette Frederick, a 56-year-old registered nurse in Milwaukee, predicted that Harris would pick Josh Shapiro — a choice that would suit her. She thinks Harris should pick a straight white man.

“I just look at what America looks like,” she said. “They’re not going to like this, they’re not going to like that. That’s just my gut feeling. She needs to pick someone they think is acceptable.”

Kimberly Peeler-Allen, co-founder of Higher Heights for America, a group that aims to mobilize and elect black women, said that because of racism and sexism — both latent and overt — a “white statesman as a validator” can help support a historic first. She recalled that Barack Obama had chosen Joe Biden as his running mate in 2008.

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“Regardless of the voter's race — white or colored — there is something comforting or reassuring in what seems like what we've had over the last 250 years in the history of elected leaders in our country,” Peeler-Allen said.

The risk, she added, is that narrowing the field in this way leaves out a lot of potential talent. “That’s unfortunate, of course, because it would exclude a lot of qualified people of color. I think there’s a lot of excitement and interest in a potential all-women ticket, but it’s also possible that it might throw some people off because we’ve never had a woman president, let alone a woman president and vice president at the same time.”

Indeed, most of the unofficial lists of candidates that Kamala Harris might choose include few non-white men. Some even whisper that Josh Shapiro—one of the potential running mates many Republicans privately say they fear most—might not be the ideal choice because of his unconditional support for Israel in the Gaza conflict, or that his homosexuality could disqualify Pete Buttigieg, who himself ran for president in 2020 and is widely regarded as one of his party’s best communicators.

~ … Strategies, believes that Ms. Harris needs to broaden her audience and that choosing a different running mate will help her do that.

“If Kamala were to choose someone like her—another woman—the message she would send is that this campaign is all about that, and that’s too narrow,” he said. “She’s running for president for all of America, not just for women.”

He added that his campaign shouldn’t be “a DEI ad” (which stands for “diversity, equity, and inclusion”) and noted that he thinks “a little toxic masculinity would help her.”

“She’s defined largely by women’s issues and Black issues, and that’s great, but is she more than that?”? Castellanos asked. How can she demonstrate that this is the case? ? By broadening the appeal of her ticket, by adding a man, by adding a moderate centrist Democratic element, like maybe Mark Kelly or Josh Shapiro. »

For some, saying that Kamala Harris should pick a white man is a pragmatic stance for a party that wants to appeal to a broad range of voters and ensure its ticket reflects the nation as a whole.

Jennifer Palmieri, communications director for Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign, pointed to Joe Biden’s promise to pick a woman as his running mate and his promise around the same time to nominate a black woman to the Supreme Court.

“I think it would bother me more if the calculation had been that Biden could have picked a white man, too, but there’s a balance to be struck these days,” Palmieri said. “I was pleasantly surprised to see that many Democratic Party politicians have said they think having two women on the ticket would be powerful.” »

And he concludes: “I don’t feel like there’s a lack of progress in this area. If a man is at the top of the ticket, it has to be a woman, and if a woman is at the top of the ticket, it has to be a man.”