In March 1968, the PDemocratic Party in the United States entered into crisis. Overwhelmed by the bloodshed of the Vietnam War, facing a serious economic crisis and – it is now known – with some health problems, Lyndon B. Johnsonthe president at the time, announced that he would not seek the nomination of this group for a second term in the White House.
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Although his decision took everyone by surprise, Johnson had been backed up against a wall for months and it was not clear, at that point, whether he had the votes to defeat his own rivals within the party, who were challenging him in the primary elections.
A few months later, in August, the Democrats chose Vice President Donald Trump as their representative for the elections. Hubert Humphrey during a chaotic National Convention that left the party fractured. The rest is history. Richard Nixon, The Republican candidate took advantage of these divisions to crush Humphrey in the November elections.
While the parallels are not identical and the outcome is not set in stone, the Democratic Party faces a very similar crossroads today. And it may even be more serious because of its long-term implications.
None of us are denying Thursday’s poor showing. It was a blow. But that doesn’t impact what we believe. Biden is delivering and is ready to serve.
Although there were already dark clouds, the storm broke out on Thursday of last week after the debate between the president Joe Biden and Donald Trumpin Atlanta. Biden, who arrived at the meeting trying to dispel doubts about his advanced age and cognitive abilities (he is 81 years old), left the meeting almost in intensive care.
Visibly tired and incoherent at times, the president was widely outdone by Trump, even though the Republican probably broke his own record for lies during a public event (one every three minutes over an hour and a half).
Fears about Biden’s chances in a race that until then looked tight turned to panic in the blink of an eye“Change and get out. See you in four years,” a senior representative of the Democratic Party told this newspaper a few minutes after the debate ended.
The president and his campaign, aware of the debacle, immediately went into damage control mode. The next day, during a speech in North Carolina, a more energetic Biden admitted his poor performance but said he was ready to move on. As the day went on, both he and his closest collaborators made efforts to paint Thursday as a “bad night” that anyone has and that does not define either his record of government or his ability to manage the country for four more years.
According to the president himself, his two consecutive trips to Europe in less than 15 days and a flu the night before were the cause of his poor performance. Despite the fact that many important voices such as that of the newspaper’s editorial board The New York Times and former Democratic diplomat Richard Haas came out to ask Biden to step aside for the good of the country, the bulk of the party (including former presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton) surrounded the president with messages of support.
On Wednesday, after an emergency meeting at the White House, The country’s 22 Democratic governors also offered a measure of reassurance.
“None of us are denying the poor showing on Thursday. It was a blow. But that doesn’t impact what we believe. Biden is delivering and he’s ready to serve,” said Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, representing the group.
The first cracks
While refreshing, their voices did little to calm the torrent that continued to fall throughout the week. The first significant fissures emerged when Democratic House Representatives Raul Grijalba (Arizona), Seth Moulton (Massachusetts) and Lloyd Doggett (Texas) published statements calling for Biden to withdraw from the nomination.
“If he is nominated, I will support him. But the president has a responsibility to keep the seat in the Oval Office, and part of that responsibility is to get out of the race if he can’t keep it,” Grijalba said.
Although there are only three of them at the moment (among almost 300 legislators), the fear is that once the dam is broken, more will begin to join. Added to these criticisms were a series of post-debate polls, both by the New York Times and CNN, in which almost three-quarters of the population said they preferred a different candidate to Biden. As if that were not enough, the gap between the president and Trump – according to those same polls – has shot up significantly. In both samples, the Republican would be ahead by up to 6 points (49 percent vs. 43 percent) and would lose in all the so-called ‘swing states’, which will define the elections.
Rumors that were spread by the New York newspaper and later categorically denied by the newspaper did not help either. White HouseAccording to this media, the president would have confessed to a close ally that he was considering withdrawing from the race.
But the angst reached a climax after a Supreme Court decision midweek that not only granted Trump partial immunity from the criminal charges he faces but also expanded presidential power.
The theory is that if Biden goes into the election weakened, he would not only lose the White House, but Congress – both chambers are at stake – since the association with his name would sink the aspirations of Democratic legislators. The Republican, invested with new powers that shield him from the law and with a Capitol at his service, could have free rein to execute an agenda that they consider extreme and that could further erode the pillars of democracy.
On Friday, as part of that same cauterizing strategy, the president gave an interview to ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos. “I had a bad night. I was sick and I felt terrible. I didn’t listen to my instincts,” the president said, speaking more coherently and after insisting that he will continue in the race.
But the fact that Biden had to go to the media to demonstrate his competence speaks volumes about the delicate moment that the president and the party are going through.
The arguments against
A real crossroads has divided the party almost in half. An important sector believes that despite his difficulties, trying to replace him at this stage of the race would be political suicide. In other words, the cure would be worse than the disease, and, to use another adage, it is better to lean towards a known evil than towards an unknown good.
“Picking someone new four months before the election is a huge risk. That’s why so many Democrats, despite the doubts Biden raises, are so reluctant to even consider it,” he says. Steve McMahona party strategist who worked on Howard Dean’s 2004 presidential campaign.
Picking someone new four months before the election is a huge risk. That’s why so many Democrats, despite the doubts Biden raises, are so reluctant to even consider it.
And the reasons are multiple. Presenting the country with a new candidate in such a short time seems virtually impossible. Not only from a political point of view, but also from a logistical point of view, since a whole new campaign would have to be built around a new name. Not to mention the selection process itself, which could leave the party even more divided.
Although Biden has already won enough in the primaries to be nominated by the party, he cannot choose a successor. At least not by hand. If he were to withdraw, the Democrats would have to choose his replacement during the National Convention, which only starts in mid-August.
The natural candidate would be the vice president Kamala HarrisBut many in the party do not like her or do not believe she can defeat Trump and other challengers will most likely emerge, such as the governor of California, Gavin Newsomor Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer.
Since Harris’s job is not guaranteed if Biden drops out, they would also have to choose a vice presidential candidate. And that could lead to a destructive and unpredictable intraparty tussle from which they would have only two months to recover before the general election.
For this group, the best bet is to surround Biden, pray that he improves in his next public appearances (he has another debate pending with Donald Trump) and trust that the chaos promised by the former president (who remains very unpopular) will be enough to defeat him, even if only just.
On the other side of the coin are those who believe that a new candidate would revive a party that has been saying for months that it does not want the current president. Something that could translate into a massive infusion of resources and high participation in the elections. Especially among certain sectors, such as the youngest in the country, who have been divorced from Biden for years and could turn out to vote.
Polls already indicate that if Harris were the candidate, the prospects of retaining the White House would increase. In the same polls mentioned above, the vice president is only two points behind Trump if she were to be appointed instead of the current president.
“If you’re driving a car without brakes and it’s heading straight for a cliff, the logical thing to do is to turn around to avoid the accident. No one knows what will happen next, but at least it’s postponing an outcome that seems certain today,” says Howard Wolfson, another Democratic consultant.
The ball appears to be in Biden’s court. While extreme ideas have begun to emerge, such as invoking the 25th Amendment to the Constitution that allows the Cabinet to remove a president if they deem him unfit to continue governing, a majority believes that only the president can decide what is best for his future and that of the country.
The next few days will be crucial. Biden has so far said he plans to press on, come hell or high water. But if he fails to quickly dispel growing doubts about his health and cognitive abilities, the pressure to step aside could become unmanageable.
Dawn will come and we will see.
SERGIO GOMEZ MASERI
CORRESPONDENT OF EL TIEMPO
WASHINGTON
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