Republicans and Democrats take opposite approaches to flawed candidates

By CNN Newsource

Published July 13, 2024 5:58 AM

Analysis by Zachary B. Wolf, CNN

(CNN) — Which one of these candidates is facing calls from members of their own party to step aside in the presidential race:

► Is it the recently convicted felon, also indicted for election interference and mishandling classified documents, who was also found liable for sexual abuse and defamation as well as lying about his net worth to get loans tied to his massive real estate portfolio?

► Or is it the incumbent president with a recent record of accomplishment in a bipartisan infrastructure law and the Inflation Reduction Act, which is a dubiously named piece of legislation that nonetheless addressed many of his party’s priorities, like climate change?

Both men are well into retirement age. Both ramble through answers to questions when they bother to take them. Both mix up names. Neither took part in debates during a primary season in which they racked up wins.

And yet one of the men, former President Donald Trump, 78, has been able to remake the Republican Party around his own divisive persona. The other, President Joe Biden, 81, has now spent weeks defiantly defending his fitness for the job, slowly emerging from a protective bubble at the White House after a disastrous debate and spotty subsequent interviews.

The next week will offer a fresh look at what must feel like a cruel dichotomy to Biden supporters.

The GOP is now built around Trump

When the Republican National Convention gets underway Monday, it will show off a speaking schedule full of far right personalities and an official party platform rewritten and simplified around Trump’s priorities.

Trump, between now and then, will pick a vice president from a short list of people who have previously criticized him but are now all in.

In 2016, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio ran against Trump for the Republican presidential nomination with insults about the size of Trump’s hands, calling him a con man and arguing he couldn’t be trusted with nuclear codes. Now Rubio is a Trump convert. So is Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio, who went from never-Trumper to true believer.

Some Democrats are moving in an opposite direction. Longtime supporters now want Biden out of the race for fear he can’t beat Trump, which is the one and only goal of Democrats afraid of his return to the White House.

In any event, Rubio and Vance, along with Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina and North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, who are also reportedly on Trump’s vice presidential short list, should be wary. His previous vice president, Mike Pence, is among the many people who served in Trump’s first White House who have not endorsed Trump’s latest election bid after an angry mob, inspired by Trump, stormed the Capitol with chants of “hang Mike Pence.”

Republicans had the opportunity to go a different direction. A CNN poll released back in February, before Trump had sealed the Republican presidential nomination, suggested his top Republican rival, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley would fare much better in a head-to-head contest with Biden. Republican primary voters doubled down, decisively, on Trump.

One of Haley’s major policy proposals was a test for for older candidates like Biden and Trump, a prescient idea since Biden is now facing calls that he take a cognitive test and Trump has bragged that he could easily pass one.

Still trying to convince fellow Democrats

While Trump eyes a convention to celebrate his dominance next week, Biden is fighting back the argument that Democratic convention delegates should pick a younger successor next month. The latest in a series of public tests of Biden’s abilities will be another interview with a network news anchor, NBC this time, broadcast in prime time on Monday.

It’s late in the election cycle for Democrats to be having this conversation, since the primary season has ended, their convention takes place next month and Trump is currently thought to have an advantage in key states heading into the November election.

There are some indications Biden is regaining some support among key Democrats. While over a dozen lawmakers have called on him to drop out, with the number continuing to rise Friday, Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina, a longtime ally, said on the “Today” show that the conversation about Biden’s fitness needs to end before it hurts the party.

“I’m ridin’ with Biden,” Clyburn said. If Biden dropped out, Clyburn said he would back Vice President Kamala Harris.

Progressives lawmakers, people like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Sen. Bernie Sanders, the Vermont independent – not Biden’s natural allies on the policy front – are also standing up for Biden, arguing the party should rally around him and mobilize for November.

Biden, meanwhile, despite the majority of polling that suggests he trails Trump in key states likely to decide the election, said at a rare news conference Thursday that he hasn’t been shown polling data that suggests he would lose in November. The fact that he said polling data could theoretically convince him to leave the race is an adjustment from last week, when he told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos only “the Lord Almighty” could sway him.

A bridge no more

Biden also said at the news conference that he had changed his mind about a 2020 pledge to be a “bridge” between his older generation of lawmakers and and a new generation of leaders.

“What I realized was, my long time in the Senate had equipped me to have the wisdom and know how to deal with the Congress to get things done,” he said.

Convinced he can beat Trump

Biden also clearly believes that he is still the best person to beat Trump – the motivating principle for any Democrat these days – and Biden has been shocked during his presidency at the staying power of Trump and the MAGA turn of the GOP.

“He thought it would be in the rearview mirror by now,” said Chris Whipple, author of a recent book about Biden’s presidency, “The Fight of His Life,” speaking to CNN’s Jessica Dean Friday.

“I don’t think he was necessarily planning to be a two-term president, but now that Trump is the alternative, Joe Biden really believes in his bones that he’s the guy to beat him,” Whipple said.

In an odd twist, then, the thing keeping Biden in the race may be the very thing that has caused other Democrats to call for him to drop out.

Article Topic Follows: CNN-Opinion

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