‘The question is, would she add me to her list?’
(Ben Sellers, Liberty Headlines) Democratic presidential contender Joe Biden signaled again that he would like former First Lady Michelle Obama to take the second-in-command slot that he held under her husband, former President Barack Obama.
Biden raised the question out of the blue Tuesday during a campaign stop in Muscatine, Iowa, The Hill reported.
It came in response to a reporter asking about a possible Barack Obama appointment to the Supreme Court.
“Yeah, I would, but I don’t think he’d do it,” Biden replied. “He’d be a great Supreme Court Justice.”
The person then followed up: “Second question is—which Obama?”
Biden replied, “I sure would like Michelle to be the Vice President.”
Biden already publicly announced a list of four Democratic women who were on his shortlist, but he later backpedaled by saying he would consider a Republican running mate.
Throughout the campaign, he has seemed particularly fixated on the idea of tapping someone who is a minority and a woman to round out the ticket.
Early on, Biden was criticized for racism and sexism after prematurely declaring he would welcome failed Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams as his running mate—even though Abrams was, at the time, considering her own presidential run.
He told Axios last month that he would also consider adding Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., to the list, even though Warren, herself, remains one of the top four front-runners in the Democratic primary.
Biden qualified his remark by acknowledging the implication in the question that it meant he was “not taking so-and-so seriously.”
Joe Biden, pressed by @mikeallen why he initially left Elizabeth Warren off of his previous list of potential VPs, says she is also a possibility. “The question is, would she add me to her list?” pic.twitter.com/hzrEUGa1mv
— Axios (@axios) December 9, 2019
Speculation about a potential Michelle Obama run has been widespread, although she has now missed the opportunity to get on the ballot in key states like California.
Some, nonetheless, see scenarios playing out in which her name could be put forth as an alternative at a brokered convention where none of the declared candidates were able to cross the threshold to secure the nomination.
During a September 2019 appearance on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” Biden previously intimated that he had asked Michelle Obama to be his running mate before dialing back the comment by claiming that he had been joking.
He also has been on record already saying he would consider nominating Barack Obama to the Supreme Court “if he’d take it.”
However, Biden’s former boss has not reciprocated the appreciation for the scandal-plagued front-runner.
Obama has pointedly declined to endorse Biden and was reported to have said privately that the Delaware elder-statesman “really doesn’t have” the magic that led him to victory in 2008 and 2012.