Warren’s base, wine-track female voters, are already going to come out to support Biden in droves. Despite her progressive politics, Warren’s supporters in the primary tended to be less ideologically motivated than Sanders’s and were attracted to her campaign because of her gender, her perceived wonkishness, and the obvious contrasts of her Harvard Law–professor status and personality with President Trump. Her voters showed up at the polls in 2018 to rebuke the president, and they are going to do so again in 2020 regardless of whom the Democratic Party chooses as its nominee.

Furthermore, Sanders voters and true believers in the socialist agenda he espouses would not see Warren’s being on the ticket as a sign that Biden respects them and that he will seek to integrate part of that agenda into his policies. Rather, choosing Warren would be apt to look like a transparent attempt to appease them — and an unconvincing one at that, considering that she essentially accused Sanders of sexism, alleging that he told her, in a private meeting, that a woman could not win the presidency.

It’s also obvious that Warren would not be an appealing pick for a campaign that needs to shore up its strength with swing voters in states such as Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.