Democrats are currently living out their worst fears. For over a year, there has been worry about what would happen if Biden seemed incapable of running for reelection, leaving Kamala Harris at the top of the ticket.
In March, as it became clearer that the president was having cognitive issues, liberal leaders began pushing the idea that the party needed to find a better running mate for the 81-year-old president.
One reason the power players in the Democratic Party are less eager to dump Biden despite his pitiful performance revolves around the fact that Harris may very well be the worst vice president in over a century.
Axios reports:
If Biden stays in, it’s for the same reason he decided to run again: He and the oligarchy believe he has a much better chance of beating former President Trump than Vice President Harris does.
Biden allies have played out the scenarios and see little chance of anyone besides Harris winning the nomination if he stepped aside.
Is the Democratic Party going to deny the nomination to the first woman, the first Black American, and the first South Asian American to be elected V.P.? Hard to see.
These allies privately think Harris would struggle to pull moderate and swing voters, and would enhance Trump’s chances.
One Washington Post columnist, in March, explained the problem Dems currently face: “[Biden’s] “history-making” selection of the telegenic Kamala D. Harris might prove to be his downfall in 2024 — and he has had enough fall-downs to make voters worry. Harris’s résumé was impressive. A former California attorney general and sitting U.S. senator, she seemed to have been created by Central Casting. Or was it artificial intelligence? As the first Black woman and the first woman of Asian descent to be nominated for vice president, she was a doubleheader.
But her evolving beliefs undercut that appeal. As a presidential candidate in 2020, she followed the Democratic playbook on issues, except when she raised her hand in support of eliminating private health insurance. She also managed to imply that Biden was racist and segregationist, citing his long-ago stance against student busing. In her famous debate rebuke of Biden, she said she had been one of the little Black girls on one of those buses.
The Kamala conundrum comes down to this: She was picked because she was Black and female, a combo tantamount to job security. Now that she has become a burden to the Democratic ticket, Biden can’t fire her. He can’t risk alienating his base. Full stop. The seriousness of this situation can’t be overstated. Biden’s diminishing faculties, notwithstanding his relatively successful State of the Union address, and his increasing physical frailty are concerning.”
Trump also understands the dynamics. Before the debate, the former president’s campaign released an ad asking voters to consider what a Kamala presidency might look like.
Earlier in the year, a book about the vice president’s tenure revealed that Biden wanted someone else as his running mate, but was talked out of it. If the president refuses to step aside, might Kamala be the Biden’s scape goat?
