Key quote:
Rep. Pat Ryan (D-N.Y.), a vulnerable House Democrat, is calling on President Biden to step aside in the 2024 race, becoming the eighth lawmaker in the lower chamber to publicly urge the incumbent to withdraw.
Ryan — who represents New York’s 18th Congressional District — told The New York Times in an interview published Wednesday that he does not believe Biden is the strongest Democrat to take on former President Trump in November.
“I’d be doing a grave disservice if I said he was the best candidate to serve this fall,” Ryan told the Times. “For the good of our country, for my two young kids, I’m asking Joe Biden to step aside in the upcoming election and deliver on the promise to be a bridge to a new generation of leaders.”
And the reason I’m not satisfied with that answer is that that’s real fucking similar to the situation that occurred in 2016, and we all know how that turned out.
I have zero trust in Democratic Party leadership at this point. If it was a normal job, they’d all have been fired for cause by now. They very clearly have no idea what they’re doing. And yet somehow, they still maintain an iron grip over who we’re allowed to actually vote for in the general.
We’re on the same page. They maintain that grip because Biden (or any incumbent POTUS) is the head of the party and decides how it’s run.
We need a firewall between party officials and the incumbent until after the primaries. It should be a level playing field until the primaries are over, and THEN the winning campaign and the DNC can pool resources. That would be in everyone’s best interest, including the incumbent. I don’t want the DNC ever campaigning against one of it’s own party members.