Joe Biden’s unsurprising decision to withdraw from the 2024 presidential race has put Democrats in a bind. Democratic Party rules require the convention to go ahead as planned. Depending on the state, Biden’s delegates may have to vote for him on one or more ballots. There is the potential for all sorts of shenanigans that would have been impossible if Biden had waited until after the convention to withdraw. What makes it all the funnier is that the shenanigans will be public and the anger among the losers will be epic. See State Laws and Party Rules for Replacing a Presidential Candidate, 2024.
To make matters worse, Vice President Kamala Harris is the most likely nominee. She is a veritable cornucopia of gaffes, stupidities, and inappropriate cackling. She presents Democrats with a monumental problem. Virtually no one wants her to be the nominee or believes she can beat Trump. On the other hand, an open convention cannot select anyone else because the Democratic Party is committed to intersectionality. Can you imagine the exploding heads and muddy panties if Harris, a woman who identifies as black, were replaced by a pale penis person in Chicago?
In lightweight of this drama, many prominent Republicans are asking the logical question: If Biden is too mentally frail to run for office, then he is too disturbed to continue as president (see “As Biden pulls out of campaign, Trump wants to know: Who’s running the country?”). This pitfall could have been avoided if Joe’s ego had been just a little smaller, or Jill’s lust for power a little less, and he had gracefully withdrawn before the primaries began.
Republicans will debate the question of his fitness to continue in office every day until Biden’s U-Haul makes its final drive to Wilmington. This question that haunts him will lead to more failures, as if that were possible.
However, the confluence of these events presents an opportunity for Democrats to appear responsible and improve their electoral chances by using the 25th Amendment to unseat Joe Biden and install Harris as the incumbent.
This is where the real power of incumbents in elections lies. It is infrequent that an incumbent fails to win re-election. When that happens, it is Republicans.
If you follow political predictions, Alan Lichtmann’s 13-key model is the most well-known example. If Harris were to become the incumbent, the Democrat’s chances of winning would change from “not good” to “competitive.”
One of the limitations of the 25th Amendment is that the Vice President and a majority of the Cabinet turn on the president. In normal times, that’s a no-go, and any group that tries it would be signing the death warrant of their political career. Since the presidency is up for grabs, an incumbent Harris is much more attractive than a Harris nominated after a fight at the convention. In normal times, the required two-thirds majority in both houses would allow the GOP to thwart this game. But you can’t logically make a lot of noise about Biden’s incompetence and then refuse to remove him.
Admittedly, a lot of things have to come together here, and the most likely outcome is that Harris is nominated in Chicago and Joe Biden spends the rest of his term as Dr. Jill’s sock puppet. However, the siren song of power is very forceful, and as we saw in 2020, there may be nothing the Democrats won’t stoop to in order to keep the White House.
