#Joe Biden picks Kamala Harris as his VP in 2020 presidential election

Joe Biden has selected Sen. Kamala Harris as his running mate, ending months of speculation that the former California attorney general and one-time Democratic presidential candidate would join his ticket.

“I have the great honor to announce that I’ve picked @KamalaHarris — a fearless fighter for the little guy, and one of the country’s finest public servants — as my running mate,” Biden said in a tweet Tuesday evening announcing the news.

“Back when Kamala was Attorney General, she worked closely with Beau,” he said, referring to his late son who served as attorney general of Delaware while Harris held the same role in California.

“I watched as they took on the big banks, lifted up working people, and protected women and kids from abuse. I was proud then, and I’m proud now to have her as my partner in this campaign,” Biden wrote.

The 55-year-old Oakland-born lawmaker was long considered the top contender given her strong prosecutorial experience, performance in the Senate, and friendship with Beau Biden.

Biden and Harris will appear together Wednesday in Wilmington, Delaware, for their first event together as running mates, according to a report by Politico.

Harris brings crucially needed youth and diversity to Biden’s ticket as the 77-year-old presidential candidate faces scrutiny over his advanced age and mental acuity.

Biden committed to choosing a woman as his veep and was lobbied to select a running mate of color after the death of George Floyd in May sparked a nationwide reckoning on race.

Born to an Indian mother and Jamaican father, Harris, who identifies as black, served two terms as the district attorney for San Francisco before becoming attorney general of California in 2011.

She was elected as the senator for California in 2016, and last year announced her White House bid before pulling the plug in December when her campaign ran out of cash.

Harris’ presidential run increased scrutiny of her prosecutorial record and she struggled to defend her tough-on-crime approach, which included supporting legislation in which the parents of habitually truant children could be charged.

Despite this, the lawmaker has billed herself as a “progressive prosecutor” and since joining Congress has supported measures to ban assault weapons and declassify marijuana as a controlled substance.

Recently, she helped pen a sweeping police reform bill prohibiting the use of chokeholds and no-knock warrants in drug cases, and joined a bill with Sen. Bernie Sanders that would give most Americans $2,000 a month during the coronavirus pandemic.

Biden’s decision to pick Harris shows the pair have been able to move past a now-infamous debate-stage exchange in which Harris attacked Biden for working with segregationists to oppose busing in the 1970s.

The exchange was seen as the peak of Harris’ campaign but was considered by some in Biden’s camp as a low blow and the senator was forced to repeatedly defend herself over the confrontation.

The two buried the hatchet and Harris endorsed the former veep in March.