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President Joe Biden took to the stage at the end of the Nato summit in Washington DC on Thursday July 11 for a solo press conference to reassure voters and his party that he’s up for the job for another four years.
But it’s unclear if the hour-long briefing has had the desired effect.
After making several noteworthy gaffes on Thursday, referring to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as “Putin” and Vice President Kamala Harris as “Vice President Trump,” Biden reaffirmed that he’s running for re-election.
“I think I’m the most qualified. I beat him once and I will beat him again,” he said. “I’m not in this for my legacy. I’m in it to finish the job I’ve started.”
Shortly after its conclusion, House Democrat Jim Himes joined the growing list of elected officials publicly calling on Biden to step aside.
“We must put forth the strongest candidate possible to confront the threat posed by Trump’s promised MAGA authoritarianism. I no longer believe that is Joe Biden,” he said in a statement.
Even some of Biden’s aides are reportedly starting to think it may be time to go, and have started to brainstorm ways to convince him to do so. The campaign is also reported to be conducting head-to-head polling between Trump and Harris.
This all comes after his disastrous debate on June 27 when Biden appeared confused and frail, made several gaffes and losing his train of thought.
Insiders have previously told The Independent that they believe there is “no question” Harris would receive the baton if Biden would reverse course and choose not to run in November. However, to date, Harris has remained steadfastly loyal to Biden’s bid.
But how would replacing Biden actually work?
Here’s the process as calls grow for him to pass the torch:
The clock is ticking
The clock is ticking for Biden to step aside.
The party’s nominee will be officially chosen in just over a month’s time at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago between 19 and 22 August.
Almost all of the nearly 4,000 Democratic delegates are currently pledged to Biden after he swept the primary races.
But during Thursday’s press conference, Biden claimed of the delegates: “They’re free to do whatever they want.”
“Tomorrow, if all of a sudden I show up at the convention and everyone says we want someone else, that’s the democratic process. It’s not going to happen.”
But it’s a bit more complicated than Biden made it out to be. During the roll call vote officially selecting the nominee, delegates who choose not to back the acknowledged candidate would have to vote “present” rather than vote for a different candidate.
Biden is for now the sole acknowledged candidate and so will likely stay as the nominee unless he chooses to step aside.
If he does step aside, it would make it easier for the delegates to vote for someone else.
Brookings Institution senior fellow Elaine Kamarck told CNN that the rule for electing nominees in place since the 1984 convention states that delegates should “in all good conscience vote for the person they were selected to represent.”
But she added: “It’s never been tested. There’s no legal history on what ‘in all good conscience’ means ... We’ve never had a convention where a lot of people voted against the person that they got elected with.”
If Biden steps aside
If Biden makes the decision to step aside, Democrats will then have to pick a new presidential nominee. And the logistics surrounding that are not simple.
The modern primary campaigning and nominating process began in earnest during John F Kennedy’s 1960 run for president. Prior to that, nominating a candidate bore more resemblance to proverbial smoke-filled rooms where party elders select the nominee away from the eyes and ears of the public.
That’s infeasible at this moment, particularly for a party that bills itself as a defender of democracy.
At the same time, Democrats would risk a battle royale if too many candidates were to emerge in the race.
Should Biden stand down, the process would have to be carefully handled to make sure this didn’t scupper the party’s chances against Donald Trump in November.
‘A process that is open, transparent, and energizing’
Enter James Zogby, a member of the Democratic National Committee who worked on Jesse Jackson’s campaigns and whom Bernie Sanders nominated to serve on the party platform committee in 2016. Zogby sent a memo, seen by The Independent, to DNC Chairman Jaime Harrison laying out how to replace Biden in the event that he does step down.
“The central idea is to create a process that is open, transparent, and energizing, while, at the same time, legitimate and democratic,” the memo reads. “And it is one that is deeply respectful of the president and his accomplishments.”
The plan would require that any prospective candidate secure the endorsement of 40 committee members — since most members are elected officials — and that they must include four members from each region.
After the deadline, candidates would appear during televised events to make their case to voters. That would culminate in a nominating process at the Democratic National Convention in August.
“It is not a coronation,” the memo says. “...For at least one month, national media will be focused on our candidates and our exciting process, drawing sharp contrast with the antics of GOP nominee. Given that we can likely predict the pool of potential candidates (Vice President Harris, Governors, Senators, Members of Congress) — the debate they will have will no doubt be respectful and substantive.”
Zogby’s proposal is an audacious one. It would require TV networks to comply and broadcast the debate. And despite his optimism, there is no guarantee that the contest for delegates would be a clean fight.
Indeed, the old ways were rife with kickbacks, corruption, and back-scratching. And Republicans would make hay of the disarray that Democrats face.
But it might be one of the few options the party has. In 2020, Democratic primary voters chose Biden almost as soon as he won in South Carolina, and then, as a way to prohibit a challenger, the party moved the state up the calendar in 2024. Democrats ostracized heretics like Representative Dean Phillips who suggested something different, even if he was an admittedly imperfect messenger for his cause.
As of now, it is unclear whether the president would actually step aside. But if Biden does exit the stage, many Democrats might want to take a look at Zogby’s proposal.
The president has tried to explain away his debate performance with a variety of excuses. He previously suggested that he was exhausted at the debate due to jet lag. He told donors that “I decided to travel around the world a couple of times,” before taking the stage, adding: “I didn’t listen to my staff” and “I almost fell asleep onstage.” He then apologized for the faltering performance that sent Democrats into crisis.
But this excuse seems to be — to borrow a favorite word of the president — malarkey. Biden spent the better part of a week preparing for the debate. He went to Camp David to workshop his responses. Indeed, Republicans complained that Biden had spent his time cloistered to prepare instead of holding rallies as Trump did.
A question of cash
If Biden were to step aside, there are a number of reasons party leaders think Harris would be handed the nomination – one of them being the campaign cash.
Biden and Harris have raised hundreds of millions of dollars over the last couple of years. The money has been divided between the Democratic National Committee, the Biden campaign, almost all state Democratic parties, as well as a number of joint fundraising committees that send cash around all those groups.
Those entities had collectively about $240m in cash in hand as of June 30. While most of the funds, such as those controlled by the Democratic National Committee, wouldn’t be affected by changing the top of the ticket, the most valuable cash is held by the Biden-Harris campaign committee, which had a $91m war chest as of May 30. Those funds have been raised by, and belong to, the Biden-Harris ticket, and which follow those two candidates.
If Biden steps aside and Harris takes the mantle, she would be able to access those funds.
However, if Biden steps aside and Harris isn’t chosen as the party’s nominee, the funds would have to be refunded or, as is more likely, transferred to a federal Super PAC. But those funds would then no longer be directly controlled by the campaign.
