Joe Biden Says He’d Choose a Republican Running Mate for 2020

At a campaign event in Exeter, New Hampshire on Monday, former Vice President Joe Biden made the absurd claim that he would be willing to put a Republican on the ticket with him if he were to win the 2020 Democratic Party nomination.

After an audience member warned Biden that he would “have to pull out all the stops” to beat President Trump in the general election, she asked him if he would be willing to take a huge political chance.

“Our 21-year-old son said the other night, ‘I wonder if Joe Biden would consider choosing a Republican as a running mate,’” she said.

“The answer is, I would,” Biden said. “But I can’t think of one now. Let me explain that. You know there’s some really decent Republicans that are out there still, but here’s the problem right now … they’ve got to step up.”

In other words, the only Republican Biden would be willing to consider would be someone along the lines of Jeff Flake or…hmm…Bill Weld? Joe Walsh, maybe? Not sure any of those names would improve Biden’s ability to win the election, but hey, we’ve heard the guy make dumber comments. Maybe he can sniff around and see what Lisa Murkowski’s doing next fall.

Presumably, one of two things was happening here. One, Biden just answered the question in the spur of the moment without giving it any serious thought. If that’s the case, we can just dismiss the whole thing as another Biden Gaffe™ and move on with our days. Two, this is something he’s actually considering. He’s trying his best to construct a campaign that will draw in Republican voters who don’t like Donald Trump, and this could be a strategy that his people have mulled.

If it is this latter position, then Biden is going to want to seriously think about firing his entire advisory staff. All one needs to do is look at the so-called primary “challengers” trying to deny Trump the nomination to see how much NeverTrump enthusiasm there still is among Republicans. Here’s a hint: It’s nonexistent. Here’s another: Mark Sanford’s campaign ended before most people even realized it had started. Here’s a third: Even National Review – which famously ran an AGAINST TRUMP issue in 2016 – is 99% behind the president these days. The other NeverTrump mag, the Weekly Standard, folded less than two years into Trump’s presidency.

Biden is playing to an audience that doesn’t exist.