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WASHINGTON, July 22 (Xinhua) -- Presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton announced that Senator Tim Kaine, a low-key Spanish-speaking ally from the pivotal battleground state of Virginia, is her running mate via Twitter and text messaging to supporters Friday evening.
"I'm thrilled to announce my running mate, Tim Kaine, a man who's devoted his life to fighting for others," the former Secretary of State tweeted, touting Kaine as a "relentless optimist."
The announcement came after weeks of vetting process by Clinton and several of her top advisers. Kaine is expected to join Clinton Saturday afternoon at a rally at Florida International University, where the student body is more than half Hispanic.
Kaine, 58, an early supporter of Clinton's campaign, is expected to be able to cement Clinton's lead among Hispanic voters and offer a political boost for Clinton in Virginia's Democratic-leaning suburban areas and among the state's independent voters and moderate Republicans displeased with their party's nominee.
In an interview with NBC in June, Kaine said he "encouraged her to run in May of 2014, because I could telescope forward and see some of the challenges that this nation would be facing. And I decided that by reason of character, by reason of background and experience, but also especially by reason of results, she would be the most qualified person to be president in January of 2017."
At a campaign stop with Clinton in Virginia earlier this month, Kaine asked the crowd: "Do you want a 'You're fired' president or a 'You're hired' president? Do you want a trash-talking president or a bridge-building president?"
Former President Bill Clinton believes that if his wife wins Virginia, the Republican ticket has virtually no realistic path to the 270 Electoral College votes needed to win, said a Wall Street Journal report, citing a person familiar with Bill Clinton's thinking. In 2000, the candidate who won Virginia went on to win the White House.
A look at the electoral map shows that if Hillary Clinton wins Virginia, Donald Trump could lose the election even if he captures other two key swing states of Florida and Ohio, said the report.
Before being elected to the Senate, Kaine served as governor of Virginia. He was previously vetted for the vice presidency by Barack Obama in his presidential campaign in 2008 and picked by Obama to lead the Democratic National Committee in 2009. He now sits on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Kaine is a welder's son and grew up in Kansan City where his father owned a small metalworking shop. He mastered Spanish when he took a year off from Harvard Law school to work as a Catholic missionary in Honduras. He later described that experience as cementing his commitment to serve others.
He then worked on fair housing and civil right issues as a lawyer and was elected to the city council in Richmond, Virginia in 1994. He became the city's mayor in 1998, Virginia's lieutenant governor in 2002 and governor in 2006. He led the state through the shooting at Virginia Tech that killed 32 people in 2007.
As a senator, Kaine called for tougher background checks on gun ownership and supported a "fast track" of free trade agreements, which Clinton's formal rival Bernie Sanders criticized to great effect during the Democratic primary race.
Kaine is married to Anne Holton and has three children. His father-in-law was the governor of Virginia from 1970 to 1974 and is said to have been a political mentor to him.
