Overnight, Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden will announce his running mate. This choice will have little impact on the vote on November 3.
Who will be Joe Biden’s running mate? We already know that the Democratic candidate will choose a woman, who will be the third woman to run for the vice-presidency of the United States for a major party, after Geraldine Ferraro in 1984 and Sarah Palin in 2008. We also know that there is a good chance that she comes from an ethno-racial minority group.
Who will he choose? Will this choice have an impact on the outcome of the election? The first question sparks a lot of speculation since, given Biden’s age, there is a real chance that the person he chooses will be called upon to replace him during his term in office or be propelled to the top of the list in 2024 if Biden completes his term and wisely decides not to challenge actuarial tables until 2028.
For the political scientist that I am, however, the answer to the second question is very simple. It’s no. Unless Biden makes a decision making a totally unforeseen and reckless choice, that choice won’t be decisive on November 3. Here is a few lines why.
Important, but not critical
It’s easy to show off things like this for attention, but running mate- rial candidates are hardly ever a determining electoral factor. To find an exception to this rule, we have to go back to 1960, when everyone agrees that Lyndon B. Johnson made a difference by tipping Texas in favor of John F. Kennedy.
With the nationalization of partisan politics in the United States since that time, the ability of a running mate to tip their home state or region has all but disappeared. Geographical balance is desirable but it is not an absolute rule. Notably, when Bill Clinton chose the senator from his neighboring state, Al Gore (Tennessee), he was mainly looking to amplify an image of youth and ideological centrism. For George W. Bush, the choice of Dick Cheney did not bring a marked electoral advantage and was intended above all to compensate for his lack of experience in foreign policy. For Barack Obama, the choice of Joe Biden was almost entirely linked to the role he reserved for him in his administration. As for Mike Pence, it was a concession from Donald Trump to the Party where he was a newcomer and, other than his unusual ability to flatter the ego of his “Dear Leader”, he does not add much to the Party. the Trump campaign.
Determining the effect of running mates on the election result is a technically difficult exercise, since it cannot be estimated in a real environment, but most of the serious political science work that has focused on it has found an effect marginal at best, never exceeding one percentage point. This is, for example, what political scientists Grofman and Kline conclude (“Evaluating the Impact of Vice Presidential Selection on Voter Choice”, Presidential Studies Quarterly, June 2010), who observe that the widely criticized choice of Sarah Palin as running mate by Republican John McCain earned her, at worst, a penalty of one point. It’s something, but it’s less than the loss that other political scientists, including my colleague from UdeM Richard Nadeau, attributed to Barack Obama because of the color of his skin during the same election (” Obama’s Missed Landslide: A Racial Cost? ”, PS: Political Science and Politics, January 2010).
As for the rare polls that ask for voting intentions for various candidate combinations, they show that with all of the top candidates being considered, Biden gets results that don’t differ by more than one or two points. As this recent survey shows, the impact of the various candidates considered is infinitesimal. (source: Morning Consult survey, July 29, 2020).
In short, if the choice of Biden’s running mate is one whose importance should not be overlooked, it is clearly an exaggeration to claim that this choice will be decisive, unless he picks up a catastrophically incompetent person or skeletons not. detected by his team come out of the closet to haunt his campaign at the last minute.
Favorite: Kamala Harris
During a visit to my thesis supervisor in June 2019, I remember that we agreed that, regardless of our preferences, the Democratic ticket would be led by Joe Biden and seconded by Kamala Harris. We should have written that somewhere, because it is still what seems most likely to me a few days before the announcement of the choice.
Kamala Harris does not bring a geographic advantage, since California is won in advance for the Democrats, but it would represent an acceptable compromise by most of the ideological factions of the party. She has the executive experience required after serving as Attorney General of the country’s largest state and has knowledge and hands-on experience in almost all major domestic policy issues. Born to a West Indian father and an Indian mother, she is firmly identified with the African-American community. Of all the candidates considered, she brings the best campaign experience.
Harris is the first choice of a plurality of Democrats, according to a recent poll (see here). Some claim that his presidential ambitions are an obstacle to his selection, but you have to be very naive to believe that any other person selected would give up on the option of moving from second to first position on the ticket. In fact, the first question all presidential candidates ask themselves when choosing their number two is whether that person could become the presidential candidate (hence the disaster of Sarah Palin’s choice). Harris is admittedly no less qualified than almost any other candidate who has preceded her for vice-president. Behind the scenes, we hear that Biden was reportedly angered by her attacks on him during the Democratic primary, but she has demonstrated in the past that she can work with Biden. Unless the fact that she received her high school education in Montreal is held against her, she still seems to me the most likely to be retained by Biden.
Other possible candidates
Speculation abounds on the other possible candidates, presented here in no order of probability of selection. Susan rice, former Ambassador to the United Nations and national security adviser to Barack Obama, has an excellent working relationship with Biden and solid executive experiences, but she poses a risk due to her lack of electoral experience, never having attempted to be elected to any position whatsoever. She is African American which is a plus, but her husband is Canadian which is suspect (note: it’s a joke).
Gretchen whitmer, the governor of Michigan, a key state Biden needs to wrest from Trump, would be an interesting choice and her recent trips to Joe Biden’s safe house have fueled much speculation. She is popular in her state and in her region but little known nationally. As it seems clear to many that Biden will seek to spare the sensitivities of minority groups in his party and maximize their participation in the vote, his choice will come as a surprise. As for the electorate of her state, she can motivate them just as well from her seat as governor.
The Illinois Senator Tammy Duckworth, of Asian origin through her mother, would be an interesting choice, partly because of her inspiring personal story. A former military pilot and Iraq war veteran, she lost the use of both legs and one arm there in a helicopter crash.
The African-American representative from Los Angeles Karen bass is still mentioned as a possible choice, but her national profile is rather modest and recent revelations about her links to far-left figures do not serve her well. The Florida representative Val Deming, also an African-American and former chief of police for the city of Orlando, rounds out the group of people most likely to be chosen. Elizabeth warren would be the party’s left wing favorite, but that fact and her age almost as old as Biden’s make her an extremely unlikely choice.
What will Joe Biden do? We will see, but if this choice is important, we can immediately take with a serious grain of salt all the interpretations that will present it as determining.