United States President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris were today named Person of the Year by Time magazine, the publication announced.
The 78-year-old Democrat, who is due to take office as the 46th President of the United States on January 20, and Kamala Harris, the first woman to take office, were the magazine’s favorites, leaving behind three other finalists: Donald Trump , the movement against racial inequalities triggered by the death of African-American George Floyd and American epidemiologist Anthony Fauci and health personnel exposed to the new coronavirus.
The cover of the magazine shows a portrait of Biden and Harris in profile, with the title “changing the history of America”.
In a text in which he explained the choice, Time recalled that all American Presidents since Franklin D. Roosevelt were “at some point during his Personality of the Year mandate”, stressing however that this is the first time that a vice president deserves the distinction .
The magazine recalled that Harris is “the first woman elected to office, daughter of Jamaican father and Indian mother”, considering that the choice “is a powerful message”, in a year of “epic fight for racial justice”.
Time also stressed that the November 3 presidential election winner obtained the highest number of votes ever, defeating Trump by seven million votes and “showing that the forces of empathy are greater than the furies of the division”.
Last year, Time chose climate activist Greta Thunberg, the youngest person to win the Personality of the Year title.
Since 1927, the magazine has chosen a personality or group of people that most marked the year, “for the best and the worst”.