Two Democratic state governors, Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania and Roy Cooper of North Carolina, and the Arizona senator Mark Kelly have emerged as early favourites to be Kamala Harris’s running mate after being asked to submit personal information in a vice-presidential vetting process.
The trio are understood to be among 10 Democrats – nearly all of them elected officials – identified by a vetting team led by the former attorney general Eric Holder. Holder’s law firm Covington & Burling LLP has been charged with the responsibility of scrutinising the personal finances, public statements and family histories of likely candidates.
Shapiro, Cooper and Kelly have endorsed Harris to replace Joe Biden as the presidential nominee in November.
The vetting process, which normally takes months, will be accelerated to conclude before the start of the Democratic national convention, which opens in Chicago on 19 August.
Even before Biden announced his withdrawal on Sunday from seeking re-election as president, Democratic donors had begun funding a vetting procedure in preparation for the need to scrutinise fresh candidates.
With Harris now looking increasingly certain to be anointed as the presidential nominee after securing the pledges of a majority of Democratic delegates on Monday evening, the focus has switched to her possible running mate.
While Shapiro, Cooper and Kelly were the first three to be publicly identified, it emerged on Tuesday that Andy Beshear, the governor of Kentucky, had also been asked to submit vetting information. He had earlier told CBS that he had not been asked to go through the vetting process.
“I do love my job here in Kentucky,” said Beshear, who has earned plaudits for winning office and popularity in a heavily pro-Republican state “The only reason I’d ever consider something else is if I felt that I can help my people in Kentucky more in a different role or that there was a chance to move past the partisanship, the constant fighting.”
Speculation also surrounded Gretchen Whitmer, the twice-elected governor of Michigan. Whitmer told a reporter on Monday that she was “staying in Michigan”, a swing state seen as vital to the Democrats’ hopes of retaining the White House.
Shapiro, Cooper and Kelly also come from states high on the Democratic electoral college wishlist.
Shapiro, who took over the governorship of Pennsylvania just last year, is seen as a rising star in the Democratic party. Biden won the state in his election victory over Donald Trump in 2020.
Cooper, governor of a state that Trump won first in 2016 and then again four years ago, was vocal on Monday in his endorsement of Harris, telling MSNBC: “If you want a nominee who can put Donald Trump’s destruction of Roe at centre stage, if you want a nominee who actually prosecuted criminals like Donald Trump, and if you want a nominee who can put Trump’s age and fitness in the forefront, Kamala Harris is the person.”
Kelly, a former astronaut and US navy captain, has the attraction of representing a border state that has been on the frontline of national concern over illegal immigration and also has a compelling personal story relating to gun crime – a key Democratic issue – as the husband of former US congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, who was seriously wounded in a 2011 mass shooting.
