There is a great debate going on in the left-of-centre political world. Should Joe Biden be on the 2024 ticket, or should he drop out of the race?
Biden skeptics argue that the president, already trailing Trump, showed during last week’s debate that his age will likely doom his candidacy. They say his polling has gotten worse over the years and he’s proven unable to turn it around, so if Democrats want to win — if they want to stave off the danger of a second Trump term — they should nominate someone else.
Biden defenders respond: Not so. Although Biden may be the underdog, he still has a real chance to win, they say. So switching him in favor of an untested candidate through an elite-dominated process with little recent precedent could be a total disaster, ensuring a Trump victory to prevent that.
Naturally, not all are making up their minds for purely disinterested reasons. Career incentives, personal loyalties, ambition, anger, inertia, or unrelated agendas all help explain why some people are supporting or opposing Biden.
For example, the loudest “dump Biden” voices are media commentators, whose career incentives are very different from those of elected Democrats, nearly all of whom have so far been publicly supporting him. Meanwhile, resentment and suspicions have grown against Biden’s top aides and family over the belief that they are hiding his condition.
So it’s not exactly a high-spirited debate where everyone is arguing rationally to determine the best course for the party and the country.
But if you’re torn about whether replacing Biden would be a good idea, here are three questions that might help clear your mind.
1) How wounded is Biden politically?
Biden suspects the debate is a disaster but believes the president’s political problems long predate — and will postdate — that event.
They noted that Trump led narrowly Most national elections There has been an Electoral College facility since last fall and above. After the debate those elections could be worse; It’s too early to say for sure (something has shown so far). actual loss As others have shown little change)
But Biden’s skeptics fear that voters’ perception of the president as an old, decaying, delusional incompetent has been cemented by the debate and will be very difficult for Biden to turn around.
By contrast, Biden’s defenders believed he wasn’t in such a bad polling position before the debate. Although he was behind, it was not by an overwhelming amount and he still had a respectable Electoral College path to victory, winning Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. Election forecasting models differ in giving to Biden 2 shots in 1 to win, or a 3 shots in 1. They point to stronger-than-expected Democratic performances in the 2022 midterms and recent special elections, arguing that the polls may be missing something.
As for the controversy, they’ve argued it was a fluke: a bad night, optimistically pointing to Biden’s emphatic speech at a rally the next day. Even if his polls drop later, the election is still months away and, they hope, Biden has enough time to turn things around.
Yet skeptics react with concern that Biden lacks the power to turn things around. They point to the White House’s long-standing avoidance of placing the president in unscripted hostile settings—which, they now suspect, reflects a belief that the president may not be able to withstand scrutiny in such settings because his age has really affected him. Why, they ask, hasn’t he done an interview or press conference since the controversy to end doubt?
2) How politically risky is the process of replacing Biden?
Biden’s defenders typically lean heavily on the argument that, whatever the president’s flaws, removing him would likely lead to worse outcomes.
They argue that the obvious choice to replace Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, would be a weak nominee given the story of Harris’ political struggles. there is has been troop. However, they say, anointing someone else over Harris, a woman of color, would be highly controversial. Opening the nominating process to the convention would invite chaos and infighting in the party, seize one of the party’s best opportunities to message its case against Donald Trump, and likely embarrass rather than unite Democrats. Better to close ranks, stick to the plan, and make the case for Biden.
Those fears are exaggerated, the dump Biden camp claims. Some recent polls is shown Harris is performing better than Biden. Any ambitious Democrats who are not elected will eventually unite around the larger goal of stopping Trump. An open house can be messy, but it will also bring attention and excitement to the party. A new nominee could get a good feel from voters who dislike both Biden and Trump. And in any case, even if the threat of chaos is established, perhaps they still prefer to stick with Biden because of his low chances.
Polling evidence generally showed how Biden’s alternatives would fare against Trump Only minor differences. In my view, such votes are not worth much. A replacement’s chances will depend on many things that haven’t happened yet, such as how their nomination process works out and how they hold up to attacks from Trump and the right.
But there is an interesting underlying contradiction here. Biden skeptics believe that the Democratic Party is politically strong, that the president is the problem, and that if they replace him with someone else, they have a better shot at staying well. By contrast, Biden’s defenders feel that the president is the only thing holding the party together.
3) Will Biden have a second term?
All of the above is built under the assumption that defeating Trump is paramount. This is of a piece with how the discussion has generally unfolded in Democratic circles.
But what is the reason to worry about Biden in the second term? Is replacing him with another Democrat not only the politically wise thing to do, but also the morally right thing for the country?
Many Democrats have long viewed Biden’s “age problem” as overblown, and to the extent they were concerned about it, those concerns were about perception and politics, not governance. Biden, they believed, was a good and effective president. Sure, he wasn’t the best communicator, but he passed major new legislation, rallied Ukraine’s defenses, and put the nation on a path to economic recovery.
Among some, there was even an unspoken sense that maybe Joe Biden’s status didn’t matter so much because he recruited good people. Basically, the democratic coalition that is in charge of establishing foreign policy and they control everything, so how bad can it be?
But that debate may spur some reexamination of those premises. Will the candidate on that stage stay in the Oval Office for another four and a half years? Will his ability to manage foreign and domestic crises be limited? How do foreign leaders see him? Isn’t communication part of the job of being president? Could it be good for the country to have a different Democrat in charge?
