Many of the resources listed elsewhere on this guide will be useful for gathering information about potential running mates for Democratic front-runner and former Vice President Joe Biden. That's certainly true of the databases and links on this guide's news, polls, and candidate background page. You can use those resources to find news coverage, public opinion polls, and biographical information about the politicians you see as possible vice presidential candidates, particularly if they hold or have held some political office.
Not many politicians have as high a public profile as sitting or former presidents, vice presidents, or major party presidential nominees. It's possible that you'll find less information in these resources about the vice presidential candidates you identify than you find about Donald Trump, Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Mitt Romney, etc. If you are struggling to find information about one of your candidates, remember you can contact Joseph Roberts, the librarian who created this guide and who presented library instruction for your class earlier this semester.
Presidential campaigns sometimes look for potential running mates that might help them win a battleground state. Since you identified them using the resources on this guide's battleground state's page, you might be considering the elected officials from those states. The links in this box will help you find out who they are.
Should you wish to consider candidates who have held offices other than U.S. senator, U.S. representative, or state governor, some thoughtful Googling might help you identify those officeholders from battleground states. Try combining the state's name with terms like "statewide elected officials" for offices like secretary of state, lieutenant governor, attorney general, etc., or "state legislature" for state legislators.
This guide's primary election results page has links to results of the 2008, 2012, and 2016 presidential primaries. For anyone considering one of this year's Democratic primary candidates as a potential running mate for Joe Biden, here are some sources of results.
Results for the most recent three general elections, as reported by several different news outlets, are listed on this guide's election results and exit polls page. Depending on who your potential VP picks are, you might also wish to see midterm election results. In addition to presidential election results, these pages include results of Congressional elections and elections to state offices. To spare you some clicking and scrolling, here are CNN's recent general and midterm election results in one place.
You might be interested in exit polls from recent general and midterm elections too, which appear on a couple pages in this guide. Here are those links again. Although these links all lead to CNN's site, the exit polls are provided by the National Election Pool, a consortium of news agencies that includes CNN, ABC, CBS, and NBC.
If you need older data, or can't find what you're looking for on these sites, please contact Joseph Roberts, Information Services Librarian, for help.