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Should there be a shake-up before the Democratic National Convention in late August, the potential for an all-female ticket might just be what the party needs, a political scientist says.
After a lousy debate performance Thursday night, President Joe Biden is now facing questions about whether he should step aside and let other Democrats run against former President Donald Trump in November.
Should there be a shake-up before the Democratic National Convention in late August, the potential for an all-female ticket might just be what the party needs, says Costas Panagopoulos, head of Northeastern University’s political science department.
“An all-women ticket would be exciting for many voters, and especially women in the aftermath” of the Dobbs decision, which overturned Roe v. Wade and sent abortion decisions back to the states, Panagopoulos says.
Such a ticket could include the likes of Vice President Kamala Harris, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer or former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, he says.
Other potential candidates who aren’t women but may possess the needed starpower might include California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, Panagopoulos says.
If it came down to it, the Democrats would need to act fast, as any of these potential stand-ins would need to step into the limelight and begin making their case before the nominating convention, which is set to take place in Chicago from Aug. 19-22.
“If the party can find a viable alternative to Biden, they need to waste no time,” Panagopoulos says. “A floor fight at the convention would do them no good.”
The Democrats learned that lesson the hard way at the 1968 Democratic National Convention, when scores of demonstrators protesting the Vietnam War were violently arrested in a scene that fueled anger toward the Democrats. Earlier that year, incumbent President Lyndon B. Johnson announced he wouldn’t seek re-election, and just weeks before the convention, Democratic hopeful Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated.
“If Biden decides to step aside and the party can coalesce around Kamala Harris, it’s best for Biden to resign so she can run as an incumbent with a few months under her belt as commander-in-chief,” he says.
Panagopoulos continues: “There are not many other Democrats out there with the kind of national name recognition required to step into the top spot, but a popular, fresh face that could energize the Democrats could also do the trick.”
But the problem becomes finding said person, and then getting the full party behind them.
“Incidentally, critics have argued that conventions have become irrelevant in the modern era,” Panagopoulos says. “My view for years has been that conventions still remain important institutions in part because of situations like this. The conventions still retain the authority to make such big changes and still attract sizable — if shrinking — audiences.”
“Essentially the only mechanism is for him to voluntarily drop out, so the only deciders who really matter are him and his inner circle,” says Nick Beauchamp, associate professor of political science at Northeastern. “At the moment there is of course no evidence yet of a drop in the polls, and it’s hard to imagine him dropping out — or even being forcibly replaced if that’s possible — without first seeing a drop in the polls.
Beauchamp suggests that there will continue to be lots of chatter over the possibility of Biden stepping down, but that “no decisions” will likely come to pass for “at least a week” while the party monitors polling.
“In a CNN snap poll, Trump was judged the winner, but by a margin similar to the margin Biden was judged to have won debates in 2020, which did not change the polls very much,” Beauchamp says. “So we’ll see. If the polls hold steady the talk may die down; if they start falling, the talk will only get louder.”