Polls have consistently shown for some time now that a majority of Americans, including a sizable number of Democrats, didn’t want Joe Biden to run for reelection and don’t believe he has the physical and mental fitness to serve. When Biden announced his intention to run again and put to bed speculation that he might retire, there were certainly plenty who were disappointed and plenty more wondering, “Why?”
It’s a fair question. The number of people who don’t think Biden is mentally fit jumped roughly 20 points since 2020. Also, it’s one thing to hide in your basement during a campaign, but when you’re the president of the United States, it’s hard to hide from the press. Exposure comes with the job, and when Joe Biden gets in front of the cameras, you can only imagine the terror his handlers feel as they wonder if he’ll say something ridiculous, if they’ll have to walk something back later, or if he’ll even be intelligible.
If Biden had decided to retire, it would have been understood. Heck, insiders claimed back in 2019 that Biden’s plan was always to serve just one term. What changed? Why did Biden suddenly decide to run for reelection?
Jim Geraghty of National Review blames Kamala Harris. “Biden’s selection of Harris was a choice that set a lot of falling dominoes in motion and brought his party and our country to this point,” he writes.
In a way, this theory makes sense. According to a Reuters report back in March, Biden is “convinced that neither Harris nor any other Democratic hopefuls would be able to beat former President Donald Trump if he is the Republican nominee.”
I’ll be the first to admit that the Democrat’s presidential bench is extremely lacking, but by running for reelection when so many on both sides of the aisle question his physical and mental fitness, Joe Biden hands the Republican Party the best possible talking point in 2024: a vote for Joe Biden is a vote for Kamala Harris. If Joe Biden truly believes that Kamala Harris is that horrible (spoiler alert: she is), then he would also be well aware that Kamala Harris is a drag on his campaign.
Related: Bad Praises Worse: Biden Says Kamala Harris ‘Hasn’t Gotten the Credit She Deserves’
If Biden were to win re-election despite doubts about his ability to serve a second term, it would mean that in the event of his voluntary departure or an act of nature, Kamala would become the Democrats’ candidate in the 2028 presidential election. In other words, he would effectively saddle the party with her in the next election. Is that really the best strategy? Kamala Harris couldn’t beat Trump or any other Republican, and as weak as the Democrat presidential bench is, I’d say almost anyone else would have a better shot.
Frankly, there was only one way to spare the democrats Kamala Harris, and that was for Joe Biden not to run for reelection. But he couldn’t do it. He had to run again because he was convinced he was the party’s best shot. If Biden didn’t originally intend to run for reelection, there’s no reason to believe that if elected in 2024, he’d serve a full term. And should Harris succeed Biden through his resignation, impeachment, or the invocation of the 25th Amendment, she’d be the incumbent in 2028, and Democrats would have to run her and put her in the position of defending the Biden-Harris record.
She couldn’t even make it to the Iowa caucuses in her own presidential campaign.
Biden’s best play was always to announce his intention not to seek reelection and force Harris to run in an open primary. Polls show her as the top Biden alternative now, but that’s largely a function of name identification. If a cognitively impaired octogenarian is the best chance the Democrats have against Trump, the party has real problems. By running for reelection, Biden put Harris on the ballot. Had he retired, she’d have been weeded out in the primaries in favor of someone who stood a much better chance.
