Walter Olson
With apologies to Shakespeare, nothing in his term became him like the leaving it.
Even those of us who regularly disagree with the policy decisions of the Biden administration should recognize that in choosing to give up his race for re-election, Joe Biden acted in the best interests of the country as well as of his party. The stark choices voters face this fall are best not clouded by forebodings of incapacity or mortality. Biden is bowing out at a point where his adherents will probably remember him as a hero.
Legally, what follows should be a smooth process. The nomination process was designed with events like this in mind. Whoever is chosen by the Democratic convention will appear on the ballot in all fifty states and Joe Biden’s name will not be on any of those 50 ballots. Both delegate nomination and donations took place against a background of published rules and neither primary voters nor donors can demand a do-over.
While some have floated talk of litigation, there are no obvious grounds for it and the courts will probably throw out any suits filed—especially if filed by Republicans, who have no standing to second-guess their opponents’ choice of candidate.
In practical terms, Vice President Kamala Harris has moved swiftly and efficiently to lock down her claim on the nomination in less than 24 hours, with endorsements from all 50 Democratic state chairs and from what might otherwise be contenders for the nomination, such as Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, and Democratic governors Gavin Newsom of California, Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, and Wes Moore of Maryland. That’s remarkably fast considering that neither Biden’s closest aides, nor Harris herself, reportedly had much advance word of his decision. It’s a quick start for her, and likely to be followed by a relatively united convention.
As for the Republicans, MAGA world yesterday had the hangdog indignation of a coyote pack that feels deprived of its rightful prey. Donald Trump must now drop his plans to keep pummeling the unpopular Biden between now and the election. The much-cultivated age issue suddenly cuts against him, with Harris nearly two decades younger than him.
While he will now seek to define Harris before she gets the chance, the initiative is with her— both in choices such as her pick of running mate and in the extent to which she begins allowing daylight to appear between her positions and Biden’s.
There will be time to come for retrospectives on Biden’s career in office and for renewed questions about the extent to which others kept his full condition from the public. But for now, the election is shaping up as a real race, not a foreordained conclusion.
