Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden has selected US Senator Kamala Harris of California to be his running mate, making her the first black woman and the first Asian American on a major presidential 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 wrote Tuesday on Twitter.

 

Biden and Harris will make their first joint appearance as a presidential ticket on Wednesday in his hometown of Wilmington, Delaware, the campaign said.

 

"Choosing a vice president is the first important decision a president makes," said former president Barack Obama, for whom Biden served as vice-president, in a statement. "Biden nailed this decision.

 

"By choosing Harris as America's next vice president, he's underscored his own judgment and character," Obama added. "Reality shows us that these attributes are not optional in a president. They're requirements of the job. And now Joe has an ideal partner to help him tackle the very real challenges America faces right now and in the years ahead."

 

President Donald Trump said Tuesday, before the announcement, that Biden had "roped himself" into picking a female running mate, adding that "some people would say that men are insulted by that. And some people would say it's fine. I don't know."

 

Biden vowed to choose a woman as his running mate in March. In the wake of protests and social unrest following the May 25 death of George Floyd over racial injustice and police brutality against African Americans, Biden had been under increasing pressure to select a woman of color as his running mate.

 

Harris, 55, who became only the second black woman to serve in the Senate when she was elected in 2016, can be expected to help Democrats' efforts to secure votes from African Americans, one of the party's most loyal constituencies.

 

Four years ago, a dip in black voter turnout, the first in 20 years, contributed to Democrat Hillary Clinton's upset loss to Trump.

 

The black vote is also central to Biden's hopes of winning Florida and Georgia, two Southern states that Trump carried in 2016 but that polls indicate could be competitive this year.

 

A former San Francisco prosecutor and state attorney general in California, Harris is best known for her aggressive questioning style in the Senate, most notably against Brett Kavanaugh during his 2018 Supreme Court confirmation hearing.

 

Harris attacked Biden in a nationally televised June 2019 debate over his past positions on busing and desegregation, which allegedly made some members of Team Biden wary of her aggressive tactics and political ambitions.

 

During a June appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Harris jokingly defended her performance a year earlier: "It was a debate! The whole reason — literally, it was a debate. It was called a debate."

 

Within minutes of the announcement, the Trump campaign released a video over Twitter in which a narrator says: "Voters rejected Harris. They smartly spotted a phony. But not Joe Biden. He's not that smart. … He is handing over the reins to Kamala while they hand over the reins to the radical left."