Joe Biden Confirms Kamala Harris As His Running Mate For 2024 US Election

On being asked whether the Vice President of the United States will be the running mate for US election 2024, President of United States Joe Biden said, "Yes, and yes." The question was raised during a press conference commemorating Biden's first year in office.

On January 19, President Biden said that he was satisfied with Vice-President Harris's work on voting rights and that she will be his running mate for the election in the year 2024. "She's going to be my running mate number one. And number two, I did put her in charge (of voting rights). I think she's doing a good job," he said.

Biden's response on Wednesday comes after Harris dismissed a question asked during an interview with a news channel on the possibility of her running on the ticket for 2024. "I'm sorry, we are thinking about today. I mean honestly, I know why you're asking the question...We're focused on the things in front of us," she said.

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Recently, some reports were doing rounds suggesting that Biden is likely to replace Harris with Republican Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming for his 2024 campaign.  For a long time, the opposition is of the opinion that the Biden administration has underutilised Harris as a political asset.

On multiple occasions, Harris has said that she and the president have not yet talked about whether Biden will be running for reelection in 2024. In December last year, Biden had said that he intends to run for reelection but has left a little room in his answer. "Yes. But look, I'm a great respecter of fate--fate has intervened in my life man times. If I'm in the health I'm in now--I'm in good health--then, in fact, I would run again," he had said.

Why Kamala Harris is integral to Biden's 2024 campaign?

Harris is the first Asian-American and African-American to be chosen as a running mate by the Democratic Party. She is also the first woman of colour to be elected as the US Vice President. In 2017, she became the United States Senator from California. At the time, she was the second African-American and first South Asian-American senator.

Vice-President Harris was born to a Jamaican American father and an Indian mother. Her ethnicity and the way she embraces it had given her a global following, making her a political figure who is recognised worldwide.

In November 2021, Harris became the first woman to hold presidential powers in the United States for a short period of time. Precisely, one hour and 25 minutes. The reason was that Biden was undergoing a routine colonoscopy on November 19 and for that, he was kept under anaesthesia.