It’s one thing to change the face on your pancake mix or pull “Gone With the Wind” down from your streaming service. It’s one thing to film a celebrity video “taking responsibility” for white supremacy or to wrap yourself in an African cloth and take a knee. But if you really want to show black people how truly sorry you are for the state of racism in America, there’s nothing quite like tanking your own career prospects to further the cause. So raise your glass to Sen. Amy Klobuchar. Whatever she was setting out to win, she deserves it.
On Thursday, Klobuchar announced that she is withdrawing her name from consideration for Joe Biden’s running mate, insisting that the Democratic Party needs a woman of color on the ticket instead. In an interview with MSNBC, the Minnesota senator said that she’d called Biden herself and told him that he should make a black woman his vice presidential candidate.
“After what I’ve seen in my state and what I’ve seen across the country, this is a historic moment and America must seize on this moment,” she said. “I truly believe, as I told the vice president last night, that I believe that this is a moment to put a woman of color on that ticket.”
So selfless. So woke.
Biden, who has famously committed to putting a woman on the ticket, may now have no other choice but to winnow that down further to women with a certain amount of melanin in their skin. Among the likely prospects: Sen. Kamala Harris of California, Rep. Val Demings of Florida, and Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms of Atlanta.
Of course, there’s always good ol’ Stacey Abrams, who didn’t miss a beat in putting her face on television the moment she heard Klobuchar was dropping out of contention.
“Joe Biden knows who the most qualified person for him to be his partner will be,” Abrams said on PBS on Thursday night. “I have never espoused I am more qualified than anyone else. He has a surfeit of good opportunities and fantastic, smart, capable women. I simply have said when asked if I’m in that number, I would say yes. I have legislative experience. I have deep legislative experience and success on a number of these issues, criminal justice reform, environmental issues, reproductive health, healthcare, economics.
“Also, I am a small business owner that understands the economy that we have to reform and recover,” she continued. “I am someone who’s worked in foreign policy. I understand the moment that we’re in because I was once an activist who pushed for change, and I used that to propel me to help deliver that change once I was in office. And I think as he looks to select a partner, I think he has no shortage of good choices, and I’m proud to be among the names that he’s considering.”
Oh, please pick Abrams, Joe! Please, please, please pick her.
Actually, it would be pretty funny if Biden wound up choosing Elizabeth Warren or some other white woman, leaving Amy Klobuchar to wonder for the rest of her life what might have been if she’d just resisted the urge to win the Virtue Signal of the Week Award. Oh well. Enjoy your moment, Amy. Hope it was worth it.
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