After weeks of vowing that he would not leave the presidential race unless God Almighty came down and told him to, President Joe Biden left the race.
There were no reported sightings of God Almighty in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, where Biden was resting up last Sunday after a case of COVID. Perhaps Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi dressed up as a burning bush and that was close enough for government work.
It wasn’t even immediately clear that Biden knew he had withdrawn from the race. Somebody posted a digital image of a letter on stationery with Biden’s name printed at the top and what was said to be his signature at the bottom, though it did not fully match known specimens of the president’s signature. No photo or video of Biden signing or even seeing the letter was made public. The president gave no interviews. Shortly after the letter was posted on Twitter/X, a second message was released conveying Biden’s endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris to succeed him at the top of the ticket.
That same day, on a Sunday, somebody filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission changing the name of the Biden-Harris committee and transferring all the funds in the campaign account.
This does not appear to be legal. The chair of the Federal Election Commission, Sean Cooksey, told Fox News’ Laura Ingraham that it seems as if the Democrats have decided to “take the money and run, give it to the Harris campaign, not bother to get any FEC guidance, and just deal with any consequences on that after the election.”
In the meantime, Harris’ people worked the phones all weekend and by Monday evening declared that the VP had locked up the support of enough delegates to the Democratic National Convention to secure the nomination, boxing out anyone else who was thinking of seeking it.
This, a chorus of Democrats and their media allies sang in unison, is democracy.
Not everybody thought so. After Biden delivered a mid-week withdrawal speech from the Oval Office, Black Lives Matter mocked his references to “saving our democracy” and to “an open, fair, inclusive and transparent process” to select the new Democratic nominee. “Nearly 2,000 DNC party bosses have already told the Associated Press that they are committed to Kamala Harris and her unknown VP as the Democratic nominee,” the group wrote on Twitter/X, “so Harris has already won the open, fair, inclusive and transparent process, which is really just for show.”
Former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich wrote a scathing op-ed in the Wall Street Journal in which he accused Obama of orchestrating Biden’s ouster like an old-time Chicago ward boss.
“I’ve known Mr. Obama since 1995,” Blagojevich wrote. “We both grew up in Chicago politics. We understand how it works — with the bosses over the people. Mr. Obama learned the lessons well. And what he just did to Mr. Biden is what political bosses have been doing in Chicago since the 1871 fire — selections masquerading as elections.”
Obama waited until Friday morning to announce his endorsement of Harris after initially omitting her from his comments when Biden stepped down from the ticket. The former president wrote in an online post, “We will be navigating uncharted waters in the days ahead” and said he was confident that party leaders “will be able to create a process from which an outstanding nominee emerges.”
The New York Post reported Wednesday that Obama was pushing for Arizona senator and former astronaut Mark Kelly to be the party’s nominee.
Former President Donald Trump told the crowd at a North Carolina rally that he wouldn’t be surprised if the Democrats pull another switch and replace Harris on the ticket. “Now if we start beating her in the polls by ten or fifteen points, are they going to bring in a third candidate? It’s like, ‘You know, Trump is killing this guy. Alright, OUT. Let’s bring in a new one. OUT. OUT.’”
Political parties are not part of the constitutional structure of the U.S. government. Over the course of the nation’s history, presidential nominees have been chosen by party delegates at a convention, by primary and caucus voters, or by some combination of the two.
What’s different this time is that the Democratic Party chose its nominee with a primary process, but beginning on June 27, the date of the first presidential debate with Trump, party leaders began a very public campaign of trying to humiliate Biden into stepping down. When he defied those demands, he was toppled in a weekend coup.
The Democratic primaries had been carefully managed, some might say rigged, to prevent other candidates from successfully challenging Biden. Fourteen million voters cast their ballots to nominate the president for re-election. Their votes were discarded as soon as party power brokers decided that a new candidate would have a better chance of beating Trump, whom they continue to insist is a “threat to democracy.”
But it’s not Trump who is seizing power on conference calls with party bosses and wealthy donors. Trump won the Republican nomination in 2016 and again in 2024 by defeating a small army of beaming Republican competitors, all convinced they were superior candidates. GOP primary voters didn’t think so. Now, having survived an assassination attempt and won a string of legal victories, Trump is just getting stronger.
If Trump wins and Republicans add to their House majority and take control of the Senate, a lot of powerful Democrats will find their earning power sharply reduced.
We may learn more about that when Hunter Biden’s criminal trial on tax charges begins in Los Angeles in September. Entities tied to the governments of China and Ukraine gave the Biden family a lot of money. They’re probably not the only political family to cash in on power in a way that won’t bear close inspection.
Maybe that’s the real reason Biden was “disappeared” from the top of the ticket before the Democratic National Convention begins in August. He may yet have his revenge.
Write Susan@SusanShelley.com and follow her on Twitter @Susan_Shelley