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The politics world is abuzz with who Vice President Kamala Harris — now the presumptive 2024 Democratic presidential nominee — will tap as her running mate. Most of the names reported to be undergoing vetting are White men from Midwestern or swing states.
According to a 19th News/SurveyMonkey poll, 40 percent of Americans said Harris would have a better chance of winning the presidency if she were to pick a White man as her running mate, compared with only 11 percent who said that picking a White man would worsen her chances.
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There is one woman on the shortlist: Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. Throughout her tenure as Michigan’s governor, she has advocated for reproductive rights, and last week she announced her position as the Harris campaign’s co-chair. She has said she would not accept the vice presidential nomination if offered, but it’s unclear how firmly she would hold that line.
Forty-two percent of Americans said that having a woman as a running mate would impede Harris’s chances of winning; 16 percent said this would help her odds.
While Americans were more likely to say choosing a White man versus a woman as a running mate would help Harris’ campaign, many said the choice might not matter. Thirty-nine percent of Americans said there would be “no impact” on her chances for the presidency if she chose a woman candidate.
The differences in opinion between men and women were small. Nonbinary people were more likely to think choosing a woman VP would have no impact instead of a positive impact, and were less pessimistic on how it would affect her chances. Nonbinary people were also less likely to say having a White man on the ticket would be an advantage.
The poll was fielded online from July 22 to July 24, immediately after Joe Biden announced he was stepping aside as the presumptive Democratic nominee and endorsed Harris as his replacement. The results are drawn from a national sample of 5,265 adults. At the time of the survey, 11 percent said they had not heard of Biden’s decision yet.
