Democrats vs. Democracy

By Dominic Pino

Friday, July 05, 2024

 

As I wrote yesterday for CapX, a publication of the Centre for Policy Studies in the U.K., Democrats wanted to make the 2024 election about democracy but are now faced with only undemocratic options for how to proceed with their campaign. You can read my full CapX piece here.

 

Biden today made exactly the case he should be expected to make when he noted at a rally in Wisconsin that he is the incumbent president and he won the 2024 Democratic primaries. “You voted for me to be your nominee — no one else,” he said.

 

Replacing Biden isn’t democratic because he won the elections he needed to win, according to the rules the Democrats set for deciding their nominee. He has 99 percent of pledged delegates required to vote for him on the first ballot at the Democratic National Convention in August. He’s the guy.

 

Of course, he could decide to quit. But he has made clear that he isn’t going anywhere. For more on why I believe he won’t quit, check out my debate-night post, “Joe Biden Isn’t Going Anywhere.”

 

The short version: Joe Biden is arrogant and believes he deserves to be president. He has been doubted and looked down upon by leading Democrats for decades, but he finally proved them wrong. His administration still functions and makes major policy moves nearly every day. He loves being president, he thinks he’s the “soul of America,” and he’s staying put.

 

Though he is the duly elected president right now, keeping him isn’t exactly democratic either. A supermajority of the American people have made clear for about a year, if not longer, in polling that they believe Biden is too old to be president. The debate on June 27 only made that more obvious.

 

And the subsequent leaks and rumors have made it appear as though Biden isn’t really doing much of the business of the presidency right now. “The whole point of democratic and republican government is to avoid being governed by an unknown vizier or prince regent,” as Michael Brendan Dougherty wrote about one of these leaks.

 

Jeh Johnson, Obama’s secretary of homeland security, basically made the case on television that keeping Biden is fine because his staff is good. That’s not how democracy works in the executive branch. The people vote for the president, and he hires staff to carry out his policies. Nobody voted for the staff, and they don’t get to call the shots.

 

As I concluded my CapX article:

 

So Democrats are in the unenviable position of choosing between keeping their candidate the people don’t like or replacing him through underhanded means, while running a campaign supposedly about the defence of democracy. And they must do this while the American people wonder whether the president they elected is actually running the government right now.

 

There’s no democratic way for Democrats to get out of this mess.