Biden Experiments

How it might go, from here to victory

The morning after the Biden-Trump debate, I had a good feeling. Perhaps it was the setting: I was in the woods, near a lake, away from the screens. I didn’t watch the debate live, but heard about it from friends. When I was asked by a stranger that day what I felt, I said that “this is a chance that has been given to us to think things over, a chance that we might not otherwise have had. And now we should use this chance.”

What would it mean to do that?

I could see how a bad debate could become a good discussion because I believe that Joe Biden is a decent and competent human being who cares more about his country than about his own feelings. This is far from just a personal impression. The NATO summit is this week: it is impossible to overstate how much trust President Biden has restored among our friends, and how much more the United States is now respected around the world than it was under Trump. Joe Biden’s record in domestic policy is unrivaled since FDR. He has made mistakes, but he has also learned, following his party, generally in the right direction. Unlike many of us, he has shown that he can change his mind. I trust that he will realize that what we face is a political question, not a medical or a personal one.

The question, narrowly, is how his political party might maintain control of the executive branch and might regain a majority in the House of Representatives. We are at a moment in history when this is not a matter of policy or politics but of regime — of the continuity of our republic.

The question, broadly, is whether the United States will continue to exist. Donald Trump has made it very clear that he will seek to change our regime to one of an authoritarian type.

Now, the continuity of a democratic system of government sounds like a moral question, and it is. But when we appreciate the grandeur of a moral challenge, we still have to think about the politics of victory.

Let us imagine that, for independent voters, Biden’s age is more of a concern than Trump’s crimes and authoritarianism (see Data for Progress’s 28 June survey for some striking data to this affect). If you want to stop Trump from destroying the republic by winning an election, what do you then do?

You can try to persuade the media to expose Trump’s record and plans, and to explain how much Americans have to lose under authoritarian rule. I have been doing this non-stop for seven years. I will keep doing it. Others should too. Yet it would be unwise to imagine that this, even if somehow perfectly achieved, is all that needs to be done.

This is a time when we need imagination more than impulse. Because the stakes are high, our emotions speak loud and clear. We might admire the president, and so find change hard to imagine. We might fear the future, and so avoid the additional fear associated with change in the present. But when we listen to our own fears we could be screening out our fellow Americans. So in imagining what President Biden might do, we should try to bracket our own attitudes.

We must also remember that, impressive as the Biden administration has been in domestic policy, every single gain will be undone should Trump win. Biden will have no legacy after a Trump victory, because it will be wiped out, every last little thing. The institutions will be changed so that even restoring the legacy later will be impossible. The only way for Biden to leave a meaningful trace in history is for Trump to lose.

For this reason as for so many others, the one thing that matters is keeping Trump out of the White House. The decision of how best to achieve this is President Biden’s to make. He is in office, he has the delegates for the convention, the nomination is his if he wants it. What might be helpful is a sense of what the possibilities are. And I do think that there are possibilities.

Perhaps the president, this time, will simply insist on the status quo. But there might be a next time, another opportunity, in days or weeks, to consider what might be best. I am no longer in the forest and have been on-line and in touch with other Americans. I realize that most people did not grasp the post-debate moment as I did, as an opportunity. But I still believe that it is, despite all of the hurly burly.

The media’s drastically unfair treatment of the Biden administration and its disastrous failure to cover Trump correctly (for a decade, with honorable exceptions) has contributed to a defensive posture among Biden’s supporters. This is completely understandable. But it can be taken too far. If your position has become: “let’s boycott the New York Times, CNN, MSNBC, Stephen King, and Jon Stewart,” you might not be able to reach other voters. When we bang our heads on the inside of our silos, that’s not a party.

If a situation like the bad debate arises again, a repetition of the defensive posture will be ineffective and undignified. If Biden himself decides to pass the torch, his supporters, above all the devoted ones, will see the point of what he is doing. And people who are not his supporters might as well.

Perhaps President Biden will simply stay the course, as he has affirmed. That is one choice, among others. It should be seen as one choice — which means seeing the other choices. The president went on Morning Joe on 8 July and spoke of his own political instinct. It is formidable. But an instinct reveals itself only in reaction to a situation. It can’t be wrong to clarify possible ways that Americans might keep the authoritarian out of office, preserve the republic, and open the future.

The crucial voters are the ones who have not yet made up their minds, or who might stay home for lack of enthusiasm. The issue at hand is beating Trump, ideally by a large margin, which will require millions of people who are not dyed-blue Democrats. Framing the discussion of Biden’s candidacy personally, as a devotion contest, immediately creates a sense of us-and-them. What we need is a verdict on what will work best to avoid the whole country falling into a permanent politics of us-and-them, which it will, if Trump wins. And that means considering the continuation of the status quo as one of several possible choices.

To see staying the course as one option among others, we need to have some positive sense of the alternatives. There is little original in my summary below, aside from the names; others (Adam Serwer, Anne Applebaum, Ezra Klein, to name three) have offered creative proposals and said a number of these things first. I should emphasize that a number of Democrats, elected officials, activists, and voters, are also talking about a similar range of possible courses of action.

And so here is my brief summary of four options, in the hope that it might help us see some light, this week or at another point.

1. Operation Consistency. Continue as before the debate. Pros: this will seem simple. An effective Biden communications teams can keep doing what it is doing. Operation Consistency preserves the advantages of incumbency. The president will get credit for continuing domestic and foreign policy successes. One can imagine that the standard factors (the good economy) and the unusual one (the risk of tyranny) will click into voters’ minds as time passes and the election nears. Cons: Being a good president is not the same thing as running a good campaign. Operation Consistency will not end the discussion as to whether Joe Biden can do both — unless it is endorsed as one of many options after a discussion or a process. I believe (and I could be mistaken) that this option is the most likely to be criticized in coming months. What appears safe in the moment might be the least safe over time.

2. Operation Carnival. Between now and the election, the clear landmarks are the two conventions (Republicans 15-18 July, Democrats 19-22 August) and a second presidential debate (10 September). But this doesn’t have to be the case. The Democrats could conquer the summer news cycle by adding something new. In this scenario, the president’s resignation from the race is accompanied be the announcement of a rapid process to select the Democratic slate for president before the Democratic convention in August. This could be a series of debates among leading Democrats, along with rapid mini-primaries or something similar. Like the two further scenarios below, this would make of Trump the old, predictable candidate. Cons: there will not be much time, and some Democrats will complain, understandably, that this is a mechanism to leap over Kamala Harris. This objection could be met, should the vice-president willingly join the contest, on the logic that what is needed is the best candidate to beat Trump. Pros: This would make life difficult for Trump, who will not know who the nominee will be until after the Republicans’ own boring, scripted convention. It would attract the attention of the media, who would suddenly have a more interesting set of events than the two boring, scripted conventions. As with the options below, Operation Carnival would make it much harder for the media to obsess only about Biden’s age and health. Regardless of who is chosen, Democrats would also have a sense of who the rising stars of the party might be, which would be useful for a party that has been a bit too dynastic for a bit too long.

3. Operation Convention. Normally, the conventions are ritualized: the delegates have been assigned as a result of the primaries, and they appear and do the expected. But President Biden could free his delegates to do as they please, and the convention could be organized into debates or discussions. Cons: Democrats who are not delegates might feel that this process did not include them. Of course, delegates themselves can consult other Democrats or the public (see option 2). Ranked voting at the convention would likely prevent the chaos that some people seem to anticipate from endless rounds of voting. Pros: as above with 2., Republicans would not know whom to oppose at their July convention, Democrats would see a number of talented politicians in action, and the convention would be interesting, in anticipation and in reality. And, as with 2, an unpredicted but effective slate could be identified.

4. Operation Kamala. Cons: Vice-President Harris does not have an overwhelming national profile, at least thus far. Pros: these would be different in the two possible variations of Operation Kamala. The weak version of Operation Kamala goes like this: the president releases his delegates but makes it clear that he supports Vice-President Harris. She thereby becomes the presumptive nominee and carries the show at the convention. This could be combined with variant 2. or 3. to generate a vice-presidential candidate chosen with input from the outside. Meanwhile, Biden remains president. Right now, we are asking Biden to do two things: the hardest job in the world, being the president, plus another very hard job, running for president. Doing one of them instead of two might be the reasonable way forward. But one could also be creative about which of the two jobs is best for him in the second half of 2024. And thus the strong version of Operation Kamala: the president resigns from office, and Harris becomes the president. This would be the most decisive possible move, ending the entire process. It would make of Harris the incumbent. As Biden’s supporters say, he has an excellent team, and we electing a team and not just a person. Harris would keep the team. She would have experience as president of the United States before the election. The strong version of Operation Kamala would free Biden to act as her surrogate on the campaign trail, a role in which he would be extremely effective, and in which he would be seen as generous and patriotic. This would be a special victory lap: celebrating his presidency and his career, and working for the future. I think he would get astounding numbers and roaring ovations if he did this.

People are nervous, which is understandable. Time is short. None of these choices is without risk. Operation Consistency is also involves risk. The question is: what is the least risky here? Which of these approaches is most likely to preserve the American republic? And which is most likely to generate a sense of hope and positive energy that will reach Americans in general? I think a President Biden who considered these options (or someone else’s better list) with his team, as part of a process, would make the right call.

I don’t fear this election. I think people will work hard and the right side will win. My concern is this: that the people on the right side, motivated by fear, will miss their chances. Giving the president options is an act, after all, of loyalty rather than disloyalty: to the man, to the office, to the legacy, and to the country.