Ted Cruz taps Carly Fiorina as running mate

Update 4:15 p.m.: Speaking from his rally in Indianapolis, Ted Cruz officially confirmed that Carly Fiorina would be his running mate were he to get the Republican nomination. Our original story appears below.

Ted Cruz will reportedly announce Wednesday that Carly Fiorina will be his vice presidential nominee if he is chosen as the Republican Party's nominee for president, sources told The Associated Press and Politico. Fiorina, a former Hewlett-Packard CEO, ended her own bid for the nomination after finishing poorly in New Hampshire in February.

Cruz needs all the help he can get in the race after being soundly defeated by Trump in all five northeastern primaries Tuesday, bringing the real estate mogul closer to locking up the nomination. In order to force a contested convention, Cruz will need major wins in the weeks ahead, namely in the delegate-rich state of California, where Fiorina was once brutally defeated in a 2010 Senate bid.

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Choosing Fiorina might also be an appeal to female Republicans, although even that is a little shaky. "Republicans don't have much of a history of following or supporting women because they're women. They're much more interested in their policies and what they stand for and whether they think the candidate is more electable in a general election," Mitt Romney's 2012 deputy campaign manager, Katie Packer, told USA Today.