This week the Hillary Clinton camp, the Democratic 2016 presidential front runner, floated the idea she is very open having another woman as her running mate. That is what many progressive members of the Democratic party wanted to hear.
The dream ticket for the progressive would be Clinton and Elizabeth Warren, the freshman senator from the state of. Massachusetts. She could bring the Bernie Sanders supporters with her and add a very big plus to the Clinton campaign.
According to Warren’s home newspaper The Boston Globe:
“Warren is one of the few Democratic women with national name recognition and a big following among progressives, a voting bloc Sanders has energized. Having Warren on the ticket could help Clinton stitch the party back together after a divisive primary.”
The problem with putting Warren on the ticket is the because Massachusetts has a Republican governor and that would mean he would replace her with another GOP senator in her place. The key point at this part of the campaign would putting Warren on the ticket be worth losing her in the senate worth the move?
The objections to a Clinton-Warren ticket are not terribly credible. Yes, Warren is from blue-state Massachusetts, not a battleground state. Recent research, however, has pretty conclusively demonstrated that a running mate doesn’t make his or her state significantly more winnable, which reduces the allure of Warren Senate colleagues like Tim Kaine and Sherrod Brown.
Follow the numbers and you see is that 92 of 94 major party tickets since the Second Party System emerged in 1828 have been composed of two men, can anyone seriously object to one composed of two women?
Conversely, choosing Warren would reinforce the historic nature of the ticket, much as Bill Clinton’s choice of fellow young southern moderate Al Gore in 1992 reinforced his claims to be a “different kind of Democrat” and the avatar of generational change. That partnership worked out pretty well, or would have had the U.S. Supreme Court not had different plans for the country in 2000.
If Warren is not on board with leaving the senate to join the ticket there are other very talented group of other women. Sens. Amy Klobuchar, Minn., Kirstin Gillibrand, N.Y., along with former Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano, Washington Sen. Patty Murray and New Hampshire Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, all are qualified to be Clinton’s running mate.
It might not be a bad idea for Clinton to name Warren to the ticket before the convention in Philadelphia. That would help her keep Sanders under control. But right now the key is Clinton and Warren figuring out how to work together and the Democrats would have a tough to beat ticket.
