How to win an open convention — if Joe Biden drops out

The Conversation with Dasha Burns

POLITICO

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4.4 • 1.5K Ratings

🗓️ 12 July 2024

⏱️ 37 minutes

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Summary

Elaine Kamarck is a longtime member of the DNC’s rules committee, a scholar at Brookings, a former advisor to top Democrats such as Bill Clinton, Al Gore, and Walter Mondale; and author of “Primary Politics: Everything You Need to Know about How America Nominates Its Presidential Candidates.” On this episode of Playbook Deep Dive, Playbook co-author Eugene Daniels asks Kamarck all of your questions about how the Democratic Party would choose a new nominee should Joe Biden step aside. Topics include: How and when Joe Biden would go about dropping out; if his delegates can rebel against him if he doesn’t; whether or not he can choose a successor; how exactly an open convention would unfold in Chicago; and what she thinks the public’s reaction will be if the Democratic nominee for president is chosen by a handful of party insiders in smoke-filled back rooms.

Transcript

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0:00.0	President Joe Biden had a lot to prove this week, to put it mildly.
0:05.0	And the place where the rubber met the road was on Thursday at his NATO press conference
0:10.0	where Biden spent a lot of time trying to convince us nosy-ass reporters
0:14.4	that he can still beat Donald Trump and that he's healthy enough to finish the second term.
0:18.8	More importantly, he basically told Democrats to get on board.
0:22.4	I think I'm the most qualified person. he basically told Democrats to get on board.
0:22.6	I think I'm the most qualified person to run for president.
0:26.8	I beat him once and I will beat him again.
0:29.7	How did Biden do?
0:30.7	There will be a lot of talk about that over the next few days.
0:33.7	I don't need to remind y'all about George Cooney asking him to drop out.
0:38.0	Jim Himes, immediately after the press conference saying the same, and Speaker Mayor to Nancy Pelosi working behind the
0:44.8	scenes to put some pressure on Biden to make a different decision.
0:49.5	And all those Democrats in Congress who are already questioning Biden's fitness.
0:54.0	That's not going to stop.
0:56.1	So as we confront the non-zero chance that Biden might have to step aside,
1:00.9	we've brought in an expert to answer all of your questions all of mine about how the
1:05.8	Democrats would actually go about replacing Joe Biden at the upcoming Democratic
1:09.9	National Convention in Chicago. We've been doing this for a long, long time and it's not a legal process, it's a party rules process.
1:20.0	Elaine Kmark is a long time member of the DNC's Rules Committee, a scholar at Brookings and a lecturer at Harvard's Kennedy School.
1:28.0	Well, let me first say I was Walter Mondale's delegate hunter in 1984.
1:33.8	So there we are a small fraternity, if you will,
	...

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