What Woman Would Be Biden’s Best Running Mate?

Chances are you’ve heard Joe Biden’s pledge to pick a female running mate. This is a smart idea, the prospect of the first female VP being sworn in on January 2021 gives a new level of excitement to Biden’s campaign among the Democratic base. However, it’s been radio silence from Biden’s campaign so far as to what woman he wants to give the nod. That decision is one that will have far reaching implications for Joe Biden and what kind of voters he can excite. If he picks a black woman, like Stacey Abrams, he can use her as a campaign surrogate to get more black people to vote in places like Philadelphia, Detroit, and Charlotte, which will almost certainly be good for Joe Biden. (In the last three election cycles, Republican presidential candidates haven’t even cracked 10% of the black vote.) The conventional wisdom is that he’ll pick a black woman for this role, and I think he will too. However, I have another woman in mind that I believe, if he plays his cards right, will improve his chances substantially.

The Working Class

Amy Klobuchar, the Senator from Minnesota, has demonstrated enviable levels of cross-over appeal with white working class voters in her home state of Minnesota. In her 3 statewide elections, she carried every congressional district, winning by over 20 points each time, in a state Hillary Clinton just barely won. As Biden’s running mate, she would lock up The Land of 10,000 Lakes for the Biden ticket. I’d also imagine some of her appeal with the working class would spill over across the Mississippi into neighboring Wisconsin, a Toss-Up state. The areas in Wisconsin closest to the Mississippi River, despite being rural, are also quite elastic politically. They’ll vote decidedly for the person that has better appeal with the blue-collar, off the beaten path, unionized, sometimes impoverished voters that are the largest voting bloc in these areas, whether that’s Trump, Obama, Ron Kind, or Tony Evers. Joe Biden himself is campaigning towards the more metropolitan, suburban, college educated vote. I get the feeling that he isn’t really campaigning to the poor rural population themselves, who are much less visible in today’s public discourse, fueling the disconnect rural areas feel like they have with the metro areas. If he doesn’t change course soon, Trump will once again win near unilateral support in white, rural counties outside of New England. Adding Klobuchar to the ticket gives Biden a useful campaign surrogate that can go into a place in rural Wisconsin and talk intelligently about issues like trade, unions, land use, COVID-19 prevention, and infrastructure to drum up support among manufacturing workers and farmers.

You know the state that loves Amy Klobuchar the most besides Minnesota? New Hampshire, another Toss-Up state. In Manchester, Amy Klobuchar delivered the best debate of her career. She sounded knowledgeable, intelligent, and enthusiastic to get to work helping the American people in real ways. The occasional quip and her subtly sassy attitude allowed her to rise above in an otherwise chaotic debate. New Hampshirites rewarded her with nearly 20% of the Democratic primary vote, which is a lot when you think about how many candidates were in the race and her vote share in other states. The Granite State had a love-affair with Amy, and she could still go there and create more appeal for the Democratic ticket.

That’s two Toss-Up states Biden would be favored in if he tapped Klobuchar. Let me remind you that if he wins Wisconsin and New Hampshire, but loses all the other Toss-Ups, he still wins, 278-260. But remember when I said Joe Biden was campaigning more to metropolitan voters? This is by no means a bad thing for Joe Biden, as Arizona and NE-2, two other Toss-Ups, have a lot of their population living in urban or suburban settings. Appeal with affluent metropolitan voters will also help in North Carolina, with Charlotte and the Research Triangle. Biden and Klobuchar could be the perfect tag team for the Toss-Up states on the board. Additionally, excepting Nevada, all the Lean Biden states (states where I wouldn’t be surprised if either candidate won, but I think Biden is more likely to win), are in Lean Biden because there’s a chance white working class voters within their borders will vote for Trump at an even higher rate than they did in 2016. If Klobuchar is on the ticket, Biden wouldn’t need to worry about his support with that group of voters bottoming out.

The Black Vote

There is one glaring issue with choosing Klobuchar as a running mate, and that’s Klobuchar’s dismal numbers with African-American voters. There was a poll taken in South Carolina in the primary that showed Amy Klobuchar with 0% support among blacks. Yeesh. She went on to get a whopping 3% of the vote in the heavily African-American state. However, Joe Biden got 49% in South Carolina, and north of 60% of the black vote. In fact, throughout the primary season, black voter’s support of Obama’s Vice President proved unshakable. There are very few people alive today more popular in the black community than Obama. Black voters not only feel like Biden is a man to be trusted, they also believe he’s on their side, and will continue what Obama started in his effort against institutional racism.

This begs a difficult question. Is African-American support of Joe Biden contingent upon him choosing a black running mate? Remember, only a generation ago, it was hard to find a black politician anywhere, as they weren’t particularly welcome in either party’s establishment. Many older and middle-aged African-Americans were young adults in a time an African-American president was unthinkable. In the present day, that what was then unthinkable has come to pass. It’s almost as if a lot of black voters are satisfied, and they’re completely fine with supporting an old white guy for president if they feel like it’s in their best interest. However, I bet a lot of black voters, especially younger voters, would feel betrayed if Biden went with Klobuchar as his main person. Klobuchar, who hails from Minnesota, has never really had to reach out to black voters in her whole career, and the image of two white people trying to become the first- and second-highest elected officials in the land may not resonate with this demographic. But I think there’s a way around this.

Biden ought to announce the people he’ll nominate to be in his cabinet. Announce Kamala Harris will be nominated as Attorney General, and/or Cory Booker HUD Secretary. This gives Biden two campaign surrogates that can go with him into heavily black areas, tap into local political machines, and generate extreme support for the former Vice President. It will show to people that Biden still has the black community’s interest at heart. Besides, one of the main troupes about Biden is that he’s, well, losing it. This gives pause to voters of all colors. But if he can surround himself with people that are viewed as “smart” on the campaign trail and in office, as long as he is willing to listen to them and let them do their job, those reservations will recede a bit.

The main issue of this of course is that a cabinet member’s position must be confirmed by 51 votes in the Senate (including a VP’s tie-breaking vote). It’s possible that at least one Republican, possibly more, will have to approve Biden’s nominees. If Biden does the strategy proposed above, Republican Senators may play politics and deny his nominees to decrease his popularity. However, if Biden is elected president, Democrats will probably have at least 49 seats in the Senate, and it’s likely that without Trump in the picture, a renegade Republican, maybe Lisa Murkowski or Mitt Romney, will elect not to play politics and vote across party lines. Even if his nominees are rejected by the Senate, we won’t know that until long after the voting is over. It’s not like Republican senators are going to say before the election that they won’t support Booker for HUD secretary or Harris for Attorney General, because that would cast doubt on Donald Trump’s ability to win the election, which is the last thing any Republican would want to do.

All in all, if Biden follows the steps I lay out in this article, he stands a very good chance of becoming president.

Thank you for reading my article. If you want more Toss-Up Central, visit my homepage: https://tossupcentral.com/. New articles will be posted at least every other Sunday at 6PM.