Who are the candidates vying to be Trump’s running mate?

With less than two months to go until Donald Trump is formally crowned his party’s nominee for the White House at the Republican National Convention, another hotly contested race is under way: to be his running mate.

Back in 2016, Trump landed on Mike Pence, the mild-mannered governor of Indiana and a man with broad appeal among evangelical Christian voters. Pence served with dogged loyalty to president Trump for four years, up to the point when the vice-president refused to go along with a plan not to certify Joe Biden’s election win in 2020. The relationship between the two men broke down irrevocably after the January 6 2021 attacks on the Capitol.

Now, Trump is reportedly weighing more than a dozen possible candidates to join his 2024 ticket. The list includes current governors and members of Congress, former cabinet members and television personalities.

While Trump has said there is a “good chance” he will announce his pick at July’s convention, here is a look at some of the names under consideration.

Tim Scott

US senator, South Carolina

Scott, 58, launched his own long-shot bid for the presidency in 2023 with the support of Wall Street donors and several of his colleagues, but suspended his campaign after failing to gain traction in the polls. Scott is the only black Republican in the US Senate. He endorsed Trump just days before the New Hampshire primary, in a blow to Trump’s rival Nikki Haley, who had named Scott to the Senate back in 2012. Now, Scott seems bullish on his chances of being Trump’s running mate. He said in a recent television interview that “maybe” he would be on stage for a vice-presidential debate set for late July, and asked whether he would be Trump’s number-two, Scott replied: “We’ll see.”

JD Vance

US Senator, Ohio

Vance, 39, is a Yale Law School graduate and venture capitalist who rose to fame as the author of Hillbilly Elegy, his 2016 memoir about his family’s experience of rural poverty in Appalachia, before being elected to higher office. Vance was at one time a prominent Trump critic. But he became one of the former president’s loudest supporters and secured Trump’s endorsement for his 2022 bid for the US Senate. In recent months, Vance has demonstrated that loyalty with a number of media appearances vouching for Trump. The senator was also among the first Trump surrogates to appear by the former president’s side in his New York “hush money” trial, and has more recently hosted a big-dollar fundraiser for Trump in his home state of Ohio.

Elise Stefanik

US representative for New York

Stefanik, 39, is a member of Congress who has been chair of the House Republican Conference since 2021. A Harvard graduate, she was initially seen as a moderate Republican, having worked in the George W Bush White House and later for Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign. But Stefanik tacked aggressively to the right in the Trump era. A prolific fundraiser who has led the charge in recruiting more Republican female candidates, she made national headlines earlier this year for her aggressive questioning of university presidents over their response to Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel.

Kristi Noem

Governor, South Dakota

Noem, 52, is a loyal acolyte of Trump who became governor of South Dakota in 2019, after serving multiple terms in the House of Representatives. Noem has been unwavering in her support for the former president, at one point gifting him a replica of Mount Rushmore with his likeness imposed alongside presidents Theodore Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. Noem had been seen as a top contender to be Trump’s running mate, but her chances seemed to diminish this spring when she revealed in a new memoir that she had shot and killed her family’s dog, and falsely claimed that she had met North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

Doug Burgum

governor, North Dakota

Burgum, 67, launched a long-shot campaign for the Republican party’s nomination for president last year, but ended his bid in December before endorsing Trump on the eve of the Iowa caucuses. The mild-mannered former software executive is among the wealthiest governors in America, having sold his company, Great Plains Software, to Microsoft for more than $1bn in 2001. Burgum had little national profile before running for president. But now he is seen as a leading contender to be Trump’s running mate, regularly joining the former president at campaign stops.

Marco Rubio

us senator, Florida

Rubio, 52, has been a US senator from Florida since 2011. A Cuban-American from Miami, he was a leading candidate for the Republican party nomination for president in 2016, before dropping out and endorsing Trump. Rubio, who is vice-chair of the powerful Senate intelligence committee, has gained favour with Republican donors who think he would complement Trump’s candidacy, especially when it comes to appealing to Latino and moderate suburban voters.

Byron Donalds

US representative for Florida

Donalds, 45, is seen as a rising star on Capitol Hill and a regular defender of Trump on television and in other media. Born and raised in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, Donalds moved to Florida for university and worked as a credit analyst and financial adviser before getting involved in politics. He served in the Florida state legislature before being elected to Congress in 2020. Donalds is among the Republican lawmakers who made a point of standing beside Trump at the former president’s “hush money” trial in New York.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders

Governor, Arkansas

Sanders, 41, was elected governor of Arkansas in 2022. The daughter of Mike Huckabee, who was also governor of Arkansas and a two-time Republican candidate for president, Sanders gained national attention as Trump’s White House press secretary from 2017 to 2019. She was also a senior adviser to his 2016 presidential campaign and is generally well-liked by Republican operatives and Trump’s inner circle.

Vivek Ramaswamy

entrepreneur

Ramaswamy, 38, a biotech entrepreneur and anti-ESG campaigner had never held elected office before he ran for the Republican nomination for president. He suspended his campaign in January, after finishing in a distant fourth place in the Iowa caucuses. But the brash, fast-talking Harvard and Yale graduate swiftly endorsed Trump and has since been among his loudest supporters, joining the former president at campaign stops and more recently at his New York “hush money” trial.

Katie Britt

us senator, Alabama

Britt, 42, is a first-term senator from Alabama and former congressional staffer who has been widely seen as a rising star in the Republican party. The youngest Republican woman elected to the Senate, Britt is married to a former American football star and has two young children, leading some Republican operatives to believe she would have unique appeal to suburban female voters in particular. But Britt appeared to mis-step with an awkward speech earlier this year in response to Joe Biden’s State of the Union address.

Nikki Haley

Former US ambassador to the UN and ex-governor of South Carolina

Haley, 52, was the last person standing against Trump in the race for the Republican presidential nomination, but suspended her campaign after he defeated her in all but one of the Super Tuesday states. While the former ambassador to the UN and South Carolina governor has so far failed to endorse Trump, her name is still being floated by some Republicans in Trump’s orbit as an appealing choice to make his ticket more palatable to moderate and independent voters. The former president, however, has shot down any such suggestions, saying in a post on Truth Social earlier this month: “Nikki Haley is not under consideration for the VP slot, but I wish her well!”

Have your say

Joe Biden vs Donald Trump: tell us how the 2024 US election will affect you