Will Biden Choose Susan Rice as Running Mate?

Susan Rice, who served as United States national security advisor from 2013 to 2017, is reportedly one of Joe Biden’s top two picks for vice president.

According to Axios, confidants of Joe Biden believe his choices for vice president have narrowed to Sen. Kamala Harris and Susan Rice — and would be surprised if he picks anyone else.

Biden is said to be nearing the end of his search for a vice president, with in-person interviews expected this week. Attention has focused on Rice, Rep. Karen Bass and Sens. Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren and Tammy Duckworth.

For those looking for a connection with President Obama, Rice, an Obama alumni, likely has an edge, She has a wealth of White House experience.

Former national security adviser Susan Rice told NPR she’s “honored and humbled” to be on Joe Biden’s shortlist for vice president and that her lengthy tenure in the executive branch would make her an effective No. 2.

“I think I could bring my experience of almost now 20 years in the senior levels of the executive branch to bear to help tackle the most pressing problems we face,” she told Morning Edition’s Steve Inskeep in an interview that aired Tuesday.

“If there’s an opportunity to serve again, I’m certainly eager to do so, but not because it’s something that I want for myself,” she added.

Rice, 55, is a veteran of the past two Democratic administrations, serving on the National Security Council during the Clinton administration and as ambassador to the United Nations and subsequently national security adviser under former President Barack Obama.

Rice has never held or run for office herself, which could work to her disadvantage.

She’s intelligent and can hold her own.

Former national security adviser Susan Rice laid blame for the severity of the U.S. coronavirus pandemic at the feet of the Trump administration recently during an interview with the hosts of “The View.”

Rice, who served under former President Obama, accused the Trump White House of throwing out a playbook for dealing with global pandemics provided by the Obama White House.

“We prepared the administration with a pandemic for dummies playbook,” Rice said. “And a table-top exercise. And so many other briefings.”

“So the fault here, the tragic loss of 150,000 Americans and counting, is on Donald Trump and his gross mishandling of this pandemic,” she continued. “He said it would go away. He likened it to the flu … he’s urged kids to go back to school in communities where the virus is raging. Every step of the way, Donald Trump has put his own personal, political interests ahead of the health and the well-being and the economic security of Americans.”

Her team acknowledges Republicans will trot her out like a show pony to highlight her early misstatements about the Benghazi attacks that were based on incomplete intelligence she’d been given, and she wants to defuse that by bringing it up herself.

The GOP is already salivating at Rice as the choice for vice president, according to Politico.

Rice, a former ambassador to the United Nations and national security adviser for Obama, is accused of revealing the identities of top Trump associates in 2016 after they were picked up as part of U.S. surveillance of foreign officials.

Four years earlier, she faced allegations that she misled Americans when she announced on national TV that the fatal attacks in Benghazi, Libya, occurred after spontaneous protests in response to an anti-Muslim video. That was determined to be inaccurate.

On Aug. 3, Tucker Carlson, a Fox News host, opened his show with a lengthy diatribe about Rice and her role in the 2012 Benghazi raid.

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