For months, hushed gossip in Washington back channels and the occasional skeptical media report has toyed with the previously unthinkable – the possibility of Democrats taking the unprecedented step of removing an incumbent president from the party’s ticket.
Yet that once-improbable scenario is now being discussed with increasing seriousness among leading Democratic strategists, activists, and far-Left critics of President Joe Biden.
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Their fear: The 81-year-old commander-in-chief’s age, slipping mental cognition, and brutal polling numbers could lead to a massive defeat to former President Donald Trump’s expected GOP challenge in 2024.
A recent viral video illustrates Biden’s rapid decline:
SUPERCUT!
— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) June 15, 2024
Corporate media: Don't believe your lying eyes, Biden's never been sharper! pic.twitter.com/FW6e2ZPT5i
Inside Democratic leadership, the discontent has ratcheted up to the point where, as one source bluntly said in The Hill, “Every single Democrat I speak with wishes they had someone other than Biden or Vice President Kamala Harris as their nominee come November.”
Those concerns reflect a broader anxiety taking hold within the Democratic rank-and-file.
Biden’s approval rating remains mired in the low 30s amid fears his unpopularity in critical swing states could drag down Democratic hopes of retaining control of the Senate. Even left-leaning voices like The Spectator have sounded alarms about “Democrats’ Joe Biden problem.”
“Let’s cut through the BS, on the three top issues — inflation, immigration, and the war in Gaza — he’s in the toilet,” a strategist of former President George H.W. Bush warned recently. “The polls show he’s not doing well with some of the key voting blocs: young voters, Black voters, Hispanic voters.”
Such concerns have fueled a “Groundhog Day” fantasy among progressives who openly hope about awakening to a different Democratic Party presidential nominee.
Making matters worse, an unexpectedly robust challenge from Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. threatens to exacerbate Biden’s vulnerabilities by providing a rallying force for disgruntled Democrats ready to abandon the president.
Polls show Trump holding formidable leads over Biden in key battlegrounds, while Trump’s campaign rallies serve as a reminder of the former president’s unmatched ability to outperform surveys by turning out his base in huge numbers.
Taken together, these factors have elevated once-unthinkable talks inside the DNC about replacing Biden on the ticket.
Such a move would still face huge logistical and political hurdles, not to mention the risk involved in ousting an incumbent president in a wildly unprecedented move.
Yet the overriding incentive – avoiding a second Trump term at all costs – is nonetheless pushing Democrats into a relatively open discussion about replacing Biden.
“While the Biden White House, the DNC and media loyal to the Democrats may scream ‘the cake is baked, and Biden is the nominee,’ there is still a very viable escape hatch come the convention in August should the Democrats choose to use it,” The Hill wrote. “An escape hatch that would allow them to switch out Biden for Newsom or another candidate.”
In this scenario, party bosses like Obama, Clinton, Pelosi, and Schumer would lead a united “intervention” to force Biden’s departure.
A replacement nominee — perhapps California’s Gavin Newsom or Michigan’s Gretchen Whitmer — would then be unveiled at the DNC August convention and anointed with a made-for-television “transfer of power” meant to rally Democrats behind their new candidate.
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“An option which would go down as the most shocking ‘August Surprise’ in modern political history,” The Hill article read.
Whether such a political earthquake is truly in the cards remains uncertain.
Despite his clear cognitive decline, Biden has pledged to run again, and any heavy-handed attempt to force him aside could risk a Democratric civil war.
His vice president, Kamala Harris, is herself increasingly unpopular and not a clear replacement, while the party’s national bench remains thin.
Yet dismissing Biden’s replacement as pure fantasy would also discount the obvious level of panic gripping Democratic insiders contemplating a second Trump term.
When survival instincts take over, few boundaries are considered out of bounds – even the politically devastating.
Only time, and Biden’s deteriorating poll numbers, will tell how desperate the Democrats have truly become.
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