Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs, Charlamagne Tha God, others urge Biden to pick Black female VP

Charlamagne Tha God, Sean “Diddy” Combs and dozens of other Black public figures called on former Vice President Joe Biden to name a Black woman as his running mate in a letter Monday.

The letter alludes to reports that Biden advisers have deemed Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) overly ambitious and potentially disloyal to a Biden presidency. It also blasts reports that members of Biden’s inner circle are holding a grudge over Harris mentioning Biden’s former opposition to desegregation busing in a debate last year.

“Was Joe Biden ever labeled ‘too ambitious’ because he ran for president three times? Should President Obama not have made him VP because he had to worry about his ‘loyalty’ when he clearly had AMBITIONS to be president himself?” the letter asks. “Why does Senator Kamala Harris have to show remorse for questioning Biden’s previous stance on integrated busing during a Democratic primary debate?”

The letter also criticizes Biden’s support in the 1980s and 1990s for “tough on crime” policies such as mandatory minimum sentencing and harsher sentencing for offenses involving crack cocaine compared to powder.

“Failing to select a Black woman in 2020 means you will lose the election. We don’t want to choose between the lesser of two evils and we don’t want to vote for the devil we know versus the devil we don’t, because we are tired of voting for devils — period,” the letter states.

Other signers of the letter include Nick Cannon, Bishop William J. Barber, civil rights lawyer Ben Crump and Georgetown University professor Michael Eric Dyson.

Biden has pledged to name a woman as his running mate in his campaign to replace President Trump. Several Black women are reportedly in contention, including Harris, Rep. Val Demings (D-Fla.), Congressional Black Caucus Chairwoman Karen Bass (D-Calif.) and former national security adviser Susan Rice.

The letter comes days after the presumptive Democratic nominee apologized for saying that “unlike the African American community,” Latin Americans were “an incredibly diverse community, with incredibly different attitudes about different things.”

Biden also faced bipartisan criticism for telling Charlamagne Tha God in an interview in May that “if you have a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or Trump, then you ain’t black.”