On Wednesday, after President Biden met with some Democratic governors, several news outlets reported he had announced in a fundraising email:
I’m the Democratic Party’s nominee. No one is pushing me out. I’m not leaving. I’m in this race to the end, and WE are going to win this election.
Of course, that hasn’t quieted the political pundit class, which has to fill airtime on cable news outlets and in podcasts, or write op-eds online and in Substack newsletters which display how brilliant they are. They all have a litany of speculative reasons to back up their opinions on what Biden should do, but very few ask the most important follow up question: then what?
If Biden does withdraw but remains in office, the Democratic party has to name a new candidate — preferably before the party convention next month in Chicago.
Side note: why does it always have to be Chicago? That’s where the Democrats convened the last time their incumbent president (LBJ) announced he wouldn’t run for re-election. Amid a combination of anti-war protests and police brutality in the streets and on the floor of the convention hall, the Dems looked like they couldn’t even throw their own celebration without it going down the toilet.
The result was that Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey became the nominee and then lost in a landslide to Richard Nixon, who went on to commit crimes against the country — which he denied, proclaiming years later to David Frost: “If the president does it, it’s not a crime.” I’m pretty sure young Samuel Alito wrote that down in his notebook under the heading Phrases I’ll Eventually Use In A Really Bad Supreme Court Decision.
Say what you want about her, but if the Dems don’t give the nod to Kamala Harris, they risk alienating a huge part of their voter base. That would be worsened if she was passed over in favor of a white guy. But in her favor, it might be a good idea to have a woman at the top of the ticket in a year when reproductive rights should be the number one issue for the party — particularly against a monster who takes credit for the reversal of Roe v. Wade and has been found guilty of sexual assault.
I also don’t know if having Joe no longer on the ballot would mollify any of the young voters in this country who have so much animosity against him because of his support of Israel and its actions in Gaza. They’re not going to vote for Trump, but will skip the presidential box and vote on the rest of the ballot, which is effectively the same thing. But I can’t imagine that Harris would approach Middle East policy differently — unless she can miraculously bring the two sides together in a peace accord. Frankly, there’s a better chance of getting Michael Cohen and Donald Trump to share a tent on a camping trip.
Now, what if Biden withdraws by resigning his office?
That’s a nightmare scenario, and not just because it makes Harris the 47th president. The 25th Amendment (ratified in 1967) demands that both houses of congress confirm by a majority vote whoever is named to fill a vice presidential vacancy. I can guarantee the MAGA Morons in the House would be in no rush to even take a vote, and since they have the power, the nominee would lose anyway. Besides, whoever it is might not fare much better in the Senate, where there are 49 Republicans, 47 Democrats, and 4 Independents who caucus with the Dems. If any of those four — Sinema, King, Manchin, or Sanders — doesn’t put their thumb up, it’s a deadlock, and thus a loss.
Speaking of a tie, if Biden resigns and Harris takes over, she won’t have someone to take on the VP’s traditional role as president of the Senate, which comes with the power to break ties. And again, if even one of the coalition of fifty-one votes against a piece of legislation, it’s dead.
Wait, there’s yet another scenario that’s even worse.
Suppose Biden steps down, Harris steps up, and then has some major health problem before election day which forces her to resign, too. Do you know who becomes President then? Mike Johnson, the Speaker Of The House, whose lips are more familiar than even Melania’s when it comes to puckering up to Trump’s rear end.
That’s a lot of what next questions I don’t see anyone else asking. But they must be answered fully — as well as any ancillary issues that might arise — before Biden makes his decision on whether or not to stay in the race.
Of course, if he does, I suspect it could be with an implicit agreement that, if he beats Trump again, he would take the oath of office on Inauguration Day but only hang around a couple of months before giving Harris the steering wheel. It has long been speculated that Nixon chose Ford in exchange for a promised pardon. Even if such a hush-hush deal did exist, Harris would still have to overcome the problems of confirming her successor, which could be an even higher hurdle to clear if the GOP wins both houses of Congress in November.
One last question, but this is for the MAGA Morons. If you’re so worried about Joe Biden because of his age (81), why would you want your guy — who has displayed even worse cognitive decline at his rallies — to have another term in which he would be turn 82 years old?
Unless the windmill cancer kills him, of course.