Joe Biden and The Democratic Party have done everything in their power to frame protecting democracy as the central issue of the upcoming Presidential election. In Valley Forge, Pennsylvania last month, Biden delivered his first stump-speech of 2024, ahead of the third-anniversary of the January 6th Capitol Riots. The 46th President said, “Whether democracy is still America’s sacred cause is what the 2024 election is all about.” In regards to his second electoral bout with Trump, he continued, “The choice is clear, Donald Trump’s campaign is about him, not America, not you. He’s willing to sacrifice our democracy to put himself in power. Our campaign is different.” These comments haven’t set-off any alarm bells among the mainstream media, but they should, as his words are yet another example of Joe Biden’s willingness to talk out of both sides of his mouth. How can President Biden speak of Democracy, while working with The Democratic National Committee to deny his own party their civic right to primary his candidacy?
Joe Biden and The DNC have attempted to effectively erase any semblance of a real Democratic Primary, all while preaching about the importance of Democracy. In February of last year, the Democratic National Committee (at the behest of Biden-allies) approved a measure to shake up the party’s nominating calendar. Most notably, the new plan shifted South Carolina’s primary from being the third state to vote to the first, and moved New Hampshire’s primary from first in the nation to tied for second with Nevada.
The outward argument from Democrats in favor of these changes was that voters of color should have a more principal say in the primary schedule, since they make up such a large proportion of Democratic votes, the not-so-obvious insinuation of this argument being that anyone who isn’t in favor of these calendar changes is racist. I don’t disagree with this argument in principle; it does make sense that the first primary elections should be in states that are more reflective of the socioeconomic makeup of the party. However, upon closer inspection, Bidenworld’s claim that their interest in moving around the party’s electoral calendar is purely altruistic doesn’t hold up to scrutiny.
I posit that the actual reasons for this shift of the electoral schedule are not in fact selfless, but a continuation of the Democratic Party’s willingness to put their thumb on the scale in favor of their preferred candidate. During the 2020 Democratic Primary, Joe Biden’s campaign suffered trouncing defeats in both Iowa (finishing fourth) and New Hampshire (finishing fifth.) It was voters of color who gave Biden his victory in South Carolina, culminating in his win in the general election. Biden’s reason for moving South Carolina up the party calendar is likely to secure the Democratic nomination by having Democratic voters that are more likely to be part of his base vote first.
Unfortunately for Biden, both New Hampshire Democrats and Republicans fought against the move. New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation status is not only a matter of tradition, but has also been enshrined in the state’s laws since 1975. In response to the attempted change, in November 2023, New Hampshire Republican Secretary of State David Scanlan, announced that the state would hold its primary on Jan. 23 anyway, in defiance of the DNC’s scheme. In an effort to convince Democratic voters in the state not to participate in the primary, the co-chairs of the DNC rules committee, Jim Roosevelt III and Minyon Moore, then sent out a letter on January 5th to the New Hampshire Democratic Party in which they inferred that no delegates would be awarded based on the state’s primary. With the letter describing the event as “a meaningless non-binding presidential preference event.” On January 8th, New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella (R) issued a cease-and-desist order to the DNC, arguing that the letter violated the state’s voter suppression laws. Rather than flout the rules The DNC had already established, Biden elected to not participate in The New Hampshire primary at all. That is, until his campaign operation realized the optics of potentially losing one of the first state primaries as an incumbent president at which point they invested more than six-figures in the state on digital and mailed advertisements for the president. Despite all of this hand-wringing over who goes first, Biden won the New Hampshire primary on Jan 23rd South Carolina earlier this month.
But the trend of the DNC effectively canceling primaries is far from finished, as four Democratic State Parties, those of Florida, North Carolina, Wisconsin and Tennessee, have already signaled that Biden be the only candidate whose name is listed on the Democratic primary ballot. Worst of all, each of these decisions was made behind closed doors, outside of the purview of democracy that Biden claims is the dividing line between himself and Trump. Four states are currently mandating that Democratic primary voters don’t have the opportunity to interrupt Biden’s coronation as their nominee in 2024, but why would The DNC stop there? In Florida, there isn’t even an alternate petition process for the other Democratic candidates to achieve ballot access.
In response to the New Hampshire debacle, a Washington Post article quoted Jeff Weaver, an advisor to Democratic Presidential Candidate Rep. Dean Philips, as saying, “The message that is being sent is you need a little bit less democracy to protect democracy.” This is the faulty message that Joe Biden believes will convince the 54% of Democrats that want a different nominee, and the 49% of Americans that currently prefer Trump. If Biden continues to give in to the authoritarian traits that power brings, come November, he will realize he is sorely mistaken.
The opinions expressed within this piece represent the views of the author alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Jefferson Independent.
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