Joe Biden, Kamala Harris Named Time Magazine's 2020 Person Of The Year

President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris have been named Time magazine's 2020 Person of the Year.

Time made the announcement Thursday, sharing Biden and Harris' magazine cover on Twitter. Other contenders were President Donald Trump, frontline health care workers with Dr. Anthony Fauci and the movement for racial justice.

"For changing the American story, for showing that the forces of empathy are greater than the furies of division, for sharing a vision of healing in a grieving world, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are TIME's 2020 Person of the Year," wrote Time editor-in-chief Edward Felsenthal.

The recognition sees Biden follow in the footsteps of former President Barack Obama and Trump, who were named Time's Person of the Year in 2012 and 2016, respectively. Last year’s winner was climate activist Greta Thunberg.

While every president since Franklin D. Roosevelt has appeared on Time's cover, this is the first time a vice president has been named Person of the Year, Variety noted.

Reacting to the news, Harris said in an interview with Time on her mother Shyamala Gopalan Harris' birthday, Dec. 7, that she was happy to be recognized by the magazine and was sure it would make her late mother proud.

"She’d be very proud," Harris said of her mom. "And she would be very focused on the issues of the day and knowing that I would take seriously the responsibility that I have and will have to address those issues.”

Harris also recalled some of her scientist mother's lessons, saying, "My mother had many sayings. She would say, 'Kamala, you may be the first to do many things; make sure you’re not the last.' Which is why [in my victory speech], I said, 'I will be the first, but I will not be the last.'"

"And that’s about legacy. That’s about creating a pathway," the vice president-elect added. "That’s about leaving the door more open than it was when you walked in.”

During their interview for Time, Biden and Harris also spoke about the election, their campaign and how they became running mates. She said they have a "robust partnership," which may spring from their shared life experiences.

"We were both raised in strong, hardworking families," Harris said about Biden. "We’re grounded in faith. We both have spent our entire careers in public service. I think that’s what makes ours a very full and very robust partnership."