Joe Biden Has Less Than a Month To Drop Out

 

Once President Biden is nominated for the presidency by the National Democratic Convention, replacing him on the ballot will be fraught. The delegates will actually vote virtually on his nomination on August 5th, two weeks before the August 19 Convention in Chicago. The WashPost reports that election law experts say that if Biden drops out before he's officially nominated by the party, "replacing him on the ballot would be relatively straightforward." If he waited until after the delegates vote, then all hell could and would break loose.

If Biden were to drop out before delegates vote, then a legal challenge by Republicans to his replacement -- whoever that turned out to be -- would lack standing in the courts, because the decision on who the Democrats choose to run is their decision, not the Republican Party's.

The real problem for Democrats if Biden should wait to drop out until after he's officially nominated are the various ballot deadlines in different states -- the date when ballots have to start being printed. We don't want to go there.

Immediately following the Debate From Hell, I wrote that I wanted an open nominating convention -- let 'er rip and we could count the corpses later. I've changed my mind. Thomas Mills wrote on July 5th a compelling rationale for why Biden's replacement would have to be -- needs to be -- Kamala Harris. And I agree with him. She would strengthen several factions of the Democratic and progressive alliance, especially women and Black voters, and I believe she would help energize the most seriously unenergized portion of our coalition -- young voters.

Mainly, I think, with Kamala we would experience a great surge of relief that we were not doomed -- irrevocably doomed -- to another Trump presidency and that we at least have a fighting chance.