By MEG KINNARD
Associated Press

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) - Former Vice President Joe Biden on Sunday committed to naming a woman as his running mate if he's the Democratic presidential nominee, making a definitive assertion clamored for by some voters who have watched a historically diverse candidate field dwindle to two white men.

Biden made that assertion during Sunday night's debate with Sen. Bernie Sanders in response to a video question from a voter about how he would handle women's health issues. Asked the same question, Sanders didn't definitively commit but said, “In all likelihood, I will.”

Biden has previously said he would seriously consider naming a woman or a person of color as his running mate.

Also Sunday night, he repeated a previous pledge to nominate a black woman to the U.S. Supreme Court if given the chance to do so as president. During last month's debate in Charleston, South Carolina, ahead of that state's primary - where a victory gave Biden momentum that propelled him into Super Tuesday wins just days later - Biden said he was "looking forward" to making that a reality.

Throughout the lengthy primary campaign, Biden has often eschewed running mate talk as presumptuous, though he has at times posited several names. Asked by a voter at a campaign stop in Winterset, Iowa, in November, Biden described several prominent women he’d consider, were he to win the nomination.

“I could start naming people, but the press will think that’s who I picked,” Biden said, noting it was premature.

Still, he went on to suggest Stacey Abrams, who ran for Georgia governor in 2018, calling her “the woman who should have been the governor of Georgia.”

Likewise, he suggested, without giving their names, that he would consider former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates and the two senators from New Hampshire, Maggie Hassan and Jeanne Shaheen.

In December, Biden told voters in New Hampshire he'd want to pick someone “simpatico” with him and his priorities, telling voters there were “a lot of qualified women” and “a lot of qualified African Americans.”

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Meg Kinnard can be reached at http://twitter.com/MegKinnardAP

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