US Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris will announce her running mate in a video on Tuesday, August 6, before appearing together at a rally in Philadelphia to kick off a five-day tour of the state.
Politico, which first reported Harris’ campaign plans, noted that Joe Biden is also preparing a video to introduce Harris as his running mate in 2020.
The culmination of a lightning-fast election process, less than two weeks since Biden withdrew and Harris became the de facto presidential nominee, has reached its climax, with interviews both in person and online.
On Monday (8/5), the candidates narrowed down to two governors, Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania and Tim Walz of Minnesota. Harris interviewed both men, as well as Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly, over the weekend at the Naval Observatory, the vice president’s Washington DC residence.
Three others are reportedly on the list: Illinois Governor JB Pritzker, Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear and Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, who is now the US Secretary of Transportation.
With polls showing him ahead of Donald Trump and Trump’s pick for vice president, JD Vance has also sparked much speculation about who Harris will pick.
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The announcement in Philadelphia or Pennsylvania, at his first rally with his new running mate, sparked speculation it was Shapiro, but Kelly later backtracked.
“My mission now is to serve the people of Arizona,” citing an anonymous source who said Kelly would not be running, as reported by the Guardian, Tuesday (6/8).
Kelly is a former fighter pilot and astronaut from the border state of Arizona, which is also a battleground state. Pennsylvania is also a swing state and Shapiro is popular with Republican voters, whom Harris courted this weekend with a series of endorsements from conservative groups, including former Trump White House officials.
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Although Minnesota is not a battleground state, Walz is more popular among young and progressive voters than Kelly or Shapiro, as Kelly or Shapiro have come under heavy criticism for their stance on Israel’s war in Gaza and pro-Palestinian protests on college campuses.
Among anti-Trump activists, Harris’s true identity is secondary to the simple need to defeat the Republican nominee.
Reed Galen, a former Republican who founded Join the Union, a coalition of pro-democracy groups, said that regardless of who Harris picks, they will be more accomplished, more competent and more normal than Donald Trump and JD Vance combined.
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Whoever is elected will then embark on a whirlwind tour of battleground states with events in Michigan, Wisconsin, North Carolina, Arizona, Nevada and Georgia.
Vance, the U.S. senator from Ohio who is seeking to improve his poor showing so far through Trump’s endorsement, has scheduled his own stop Tuesday in Philadelphia to campaign.
CBS polls show Harris and Trump tied in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Arizona. Harris has a two-point lead in Nevada. Trump has a three-point lead in North Carolina and Georgia, and a one-point lead in Wisconsin. (I-2)
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