Joe Biden picks Harris, California senator, as running mate

Joe Biden, presidential candidate of Democratic Party, has picked Kamala Harris, one of the aspirants who sought the part’s presidential ticket, as running mate.

Harris, a senator from California, is the first black woman to compete on a major party’s presidential ticket in US history.

The first-term senator became a top contender for the number two spot after her own White House campaign ended.

In 2017, Harris was sworn in as the second African-American woman and first South Asian-American senator in history.

The California Democrat was born in Oakland, California, to two immigrant parents: an Indian-born mother and Jamaican-born father.

She went on to attend Howard University, one of the nation’s preeminent historically black colleges and universities, which she has described as among the most formative experiences of her life.

After her parent’s divorce, Harris was raised primarily by her Hindu single mother, a cancer researcher and civil rights activist.

“My mother understood very well that she was raising two black daughters,” she wrote in her autobiography The Truths We Hold.

“She knew that her adopted homeland would see Maya and me as black girls and she was determined to make sure we would grow into confident, proud black women.”

Harris won her first election in 2003 when she became San Francisco’s district attorney.

In the role, she created a reentry programme for low-level drug offenders and cracked down on student truancy.